Lesson for December 2, 2020
Knowing the Bible
Lesson 28
The Epistles of Paul
The Book of Romans
Date: 60 A.D.
Theme: Justification by Faith through the Righteousness of God
Romans 6:23-26, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in God’s merciful restraint He let the sins previously committed go unpunished; for the demonstration, that is, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
Being justified as a gift by His grace is the Greek verb “dikaioo” for justified, which means to treat as just, to justify, to vindicate, to make or declare righteous or to validate. The unbeliever at the moment he receives Christ as Saviour receives God’s perfect righteousness, one half of divine integrity. The Greek word for gift is “dorean,” which means gratuitously, without payment or freely. The Greek word for grace is “charis” meaning a favour bestowed, a benefit which is undeserved or unearned.
Through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus is the Greek word “apolutrosis” for redemption, which means to buy back slaves or captives, to free by paying a ransom for a slave or a captive. We have studied this concept under the doctrine of the Kinsman Redeemer. The Old Testament practice of the Kinsman Redeemer is the perfect example of how Christ redeems us from the Law and from sin. Certain requirements had to be met in order for a person to free someone from slavery. The redeemer had to be a relative, he had to be able to redeem by meeting the purchase price and he had to be willing to redeem the person in slavery.
The human birth of Jesus Christ assured that He was a relative (kinsman) to all mankind. (John 1:1-3,14) In order to meet the purchase price, Christ had to be perfect (no sin of His own to pay for). He was born of a virgin therefore He had no sin nature, and He lived a sinless life which qualified Him to meet the purchase price for our sin. (Matthew 1:23, I Timothy 3:16; Romans 5:8; II Corinthians 5:21, Hebrews 2:9-11, 4:15: I Peter 1:18) Christ was also willing to redeem us. He was obedient to the Father’s plan for salvation and gave His life freely. Christ even restricted the use of the power of His deity (doctrine of Kenosis) and used the power of the Holy Spirit to accomplish all of this for us. (Philippians 2:5-8; Romans 5:19, Luke 22:42, 23:46)
Because in God’s merciful restraint He let the sins previously committed go unpunished. The justice of God held up judgment until Christ could die on the Cross. This means that there was a delay in the judgment of all the sins in the human race until Christ could be judged for them on the Cross. The Greek word for merciful restraint is “anoche,” which means a delay in punishment or clemency. The delay is not the same as overlooking sin. God never overlooks sin, but He did delay the punishment for sin until the Cross when it was poured out upon Christ as the substitute for the entire human race.
The Books of I Corinthians
Date: 59 A.D.
Theme: The Christian Way of Life
I Corinthians 1:10,“Now I exhort you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be made complete in the same mind and in the same judgment.
Paul had completed his greeting and reminder of the position that these believers hold in the body of Christ. Paul was about to launch into a doctrinal lesson on divine viewpoint verses human viewpoint. Paul begins with an exhortation of unity of thought, purpose and opinion regarding all things doctrinal. Paul founded this church in Corinth and had taught them basic Bible doctrine. Apollos had continued the teaching ministry, but these believers had been blinded by their own arrogance into believing some were better than others. The problem Paul addresses first is their arrogance regarding water baptism.
This first exhortation is important because the impact of the Corinthian church on the community of Corinth and that area of Greece had gone down to almost zero. The reason was that people were misinformed as to what Christianity really is and what position Christianity takes on any subject simply because these people, not by their words but by the content of their message, were declaring human viewpoint. Speaking the same thing is accomplished where you have people consistently declaring the Gospel the same way and teaching spirituality the same way. This is one of the most difficult of all the exhortations that Paul gave because it required a lot of doctrine to get to this point. The more doctrine there is the more there is uniformity of divine opinion as opposed to human opinion on any given subject. It is impossible to express divine viewpoint apart from knowledge of Bible doctrine.
Divisions were being caused because in some there was divine viewpoint and in some there was human viewpoint. There was another cause for dissension: arrogance – each person contending that they are right and trying to superimpose their system and themselves on the congregation as its leaders.
The Books of II Corinthians
Date: 59 A.D.
Theme: Paul’s Defense of His Apostleship
II Corinthians 10:2-11, “I ask that when I am present, I need not be bold with the confidence with which I propose to be courageous against some, who regard us as if we walked according to the flesh. For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses.We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every thought captive to the obedience of Christ, and we are ready to punish all disobedience, whenever your obedience is complete. You are looking at things as they are outwardly. If anyone is confident in himself that he is Christ’s, let him consider this again within himself, that just as he is Christ’s, so also are we. For even if I boast somewhat further about our authority, which the Lord gave for building you up and not for destroying you, I will not be put to shame, for I do not wish to seem as if I would terrify you by my letters. For they say, “His letters are weighty and strong, but his personal presence is unimpressive and his speech contemptible.”Let such a person consider this, that what we are in word by letters when absent, such persons we are also in deed when present.”
Accused by the reversionists of being controlled by their sin natures, Paul defends himself and his team. Paul was also accused of not being bold in his speech when he was with them face-to-face, but only when he wrote to them. He also refuted this false claim. What we find in this chapter is a man, Paul, who could be gentle and meek and bold and authoritative when necessary. This is the role of the pastor-teacher at various times. This chapter also deals with the subject of thinking. In the Christian life a thinking. (Proverbs 23:7; Isaiah 55:7-9)
The Book of Galatians
Date:60 A.D.
Theme: The Gospel of Grace
The purpose of the letter was to vindicate the Gospel of grace as opposed to human works, keeping the Mosaic Law and legalism. Paul refutes two false doctrines that were being set forth by a group called the Judaizers. This group was teaching keeping the law for both salvation and the spiritual life. Both of these false doctrines were addressed by Paul in the book of Galatians and shown to be false.
Galatians 1:12 states that this Gospel, which Paul preached, was not given to him by any human being nor did any human being contrive it and teach it to him. It was a direct revelation from Jesus Christ to Paul. It seems obvious that the Judaizers did not take Paul’s claim of apostleship as valid, or at least questioned it.
Paul’s statement that Jesus Christ was the Person Who revealed the truth of the Gospel to him lines up with the three years he spent in Arabia after his conversion. The Greek word for revelation is “apokalupto” and means to remove that which is concealed. The words of Jesus Christ in Greek are in the subjective genitive, meaning that Christ is the One acting upon the noun (revelation). In other words, Jesus Christ was the One revealing truth to Paul.
Now that Paul had successfully defended his apostleship, he confronted the false doctrine of keeping the Law for salvation and for the Christian Way of Life. Paul began with a rather harsh Greek word to describe the Galatians who had abandoned grace. Paul called them foolish, which is the Greek word “anoetos,” and means lacking the power of perception or failing to properly reflect on a subject.
The Galatian believers to whom this letter was written had accepted Paul’s message of grace, but he said they had lost their power of perception and thus had allowed themselves to be misled by the Judaizers. The King James Version of the Bible uses the word, bewitch to describe what the Judaizers were doing. Bewitch is the Greek word “baskaino,” which means to give the “evil eye” or to charm them. Paul asked these believers who it was that had charmed them (though I’m sure he already knew) to the point of turning their backs on the truth.
The Book of Ephesians
Date: 64 A.D.
Theme: The Spiritual Walk of the Believer
Chapter 4:17-24,“So, this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness. “But you did not learn Christ in this way,if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus. That, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit,and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind, and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.”
Verse 17-32 can be titled “The Spiritual Walk of the Believer.” To walk like the Gentiles is a reference to the mental attitude and manner of living of an unbeliever in Ephesus at that time. When Paul said that he affirms together with the Lord, it is a very strong statement as to what was going to follow in the next several verses. We know that Paul was a “straight shooter” and did not hesitate to admonish when it was necessary. Believers who are negative toward doctrine need to be admonished. There are two ways in which this can be accomplished. They can be admonished verbally, or they can be admonished experientially by various categories of divine discipline. Any believer who is inconsistent in the intake and application of doctrine falls into this category. Affirming together with the Lord means every time he taught, he was under oath to tell the truth. Paul was bearing witness to what Christ had already said regarding the walk of the believer.
The Greek word for walk is “peripateo,” which means to have a pattern, a way of life, a thought pattern, a behavior pattern. It is used in this verse to say that you should not continue walking on the road to reversionism. Paul was writing to a large number of believers who are already on the road to reversionism. Therefore, this was a challenge to get off that road and get on to the road to spiritual maturity and super-grace. No longer means that they had been walking just like all unbelievers in their part of the Roman world.
How did they keep walking? They kept walking in the futility of their mind. The Greek word for futility is “mataiotes,” whichmeans emptiness or vanity. It has the concept of a vacuum and that is the way it should be translated — “by the vacuum of their mind.” Emptiness denotes that they are devoid of truth, they have a vacuum in the soul, and this vacuum is specifically of their mind. In other words, religion, legalism, and false doctrines had infiltrated the souls of these reversionistic believers. They have taken on the same thought pattern of the unbelievers in their decadent society. In this manner all of these things have been infiltrated through a vacuum. Through this vacuum comes the doctrine of demons, and Human Viewpoint Thinking. They had believed in Jesus Christ, they were believers, they are members of the Royal Family of God, they could not lose their salvation, they were indwelt by God the Holy Spirit, sealed by the Holy Spirit, given a spiritual gift by the Holy Spirit, but they were succumbing to the apostasy of the unbelieving society around them.