ROMANS 15
This chapter continues the thought of the beautiful spirit of grace which is to mark the saints in their mutual relations: and which is necessary, not only for their good and edification, but that God may be glorified in their unity before Him in praise. “That ye may with one accord, with one mouth, glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”. To secure this the mutual relations of saints must be according to grace. There may be self-pleasing in using one’s liberty; it may be used in a way that does harm to others. We are to consider what will be good for others, to please our neighbour rather than ourselves, that all may tend to what will edify. If we are strong, we are to use our strength to bear the infirmities of the weak, not to despise them or brush them aside by a hard insistence even on the letter of the truth.
We can see how necessary this was in the early days, when Jews and Gentiles were thrown together for the first time in the assembly. The Jew with ceremonial ideas about clean and unclean meats, and with certain legal elements clinging to him which the gospel had not yet dispelled, and the Gentile quite free from these things, and probably in many cases more established with grace. Strength was to be shown by bearing infirmities, and by consideration for one another.
“The weak” would be those who were not in full Christian liberty, persons legal in their view of things which are not really important in the light of present revelation. Their infirmities were to be borne as a charge upon those who were stronger in grace. We are not to please ourselves, but each one of us is to “please his neighbour with a view to what is good, to edification”. To apply this principle in our practical relations with one another would greatly help us. Sometimes the assurance that we are right makes us hard, and on that line we may get altogether away from the spirit of grace, and be really pleasing ourselves.
Hence the importance of giving heed to this touching reference to Christ: “For the Christ also did not please himself”. An allusion to what Christ was personally is always very appealing to those who love Him. He surely moved in perfect liberty, and if He had pleased Himself it would always have been to do what was absolutely right. If ever any one was entitled to please himself it was He. But He did not live on that principle. There is nothing more marvellous than that He should say, “For I am come down from heaven, not that I should do my will, but the will of him that has sent me”, John 6: 38. His own will would have been absolutely right and perfect, but He did not come on the principle of doing His own will at all. We sometimes justify our own will because we feel sure that we will what is right, but Christ was not here on the line of His will at all, but to do the will of the Father. Then, in the scripture before us, He “did not please himself”. Are we really in that spirit in our relations with the brethren! Alas! God’s portion is largely diminished by the lack of it.
[p. 225] Everything that comes up tests our spirits. We sometimes think we are standing for doctrines or divine principles, when the truth is that we are being tested as to the spirit we are of. The spirit and inwardness of Christ was not to do His own will, or to please Himself. It is marvellous — and truly humbling — to consider Him!
“The Christ also did not please himself”. He was here to represent God to men so faithfully that all that men had to say against God fell on Him. “The reproaches of them that reproach thee have fallen upon me”. He would be before men identified with all that God was, and bear the reproach of it. The reproach that lay on God in the eye of the Jew was His grace. In Luke 4 they “wondered at the words of grace which were coming out of his mouth”, but when He showed divine grace in concrete expression in the blessing of a Sidonian widow or a Syrian leper they took Him to the top of the hill to cast Him down. The reproach which attached to Him was that He expressed God in grace; He made nothing of the self-righteous pretensions of men; He was a Friend of publicans and sinners. He did not please Himself; He expressed God in grace, and He bore reproach. Such is to be the path of the saint! We are to be identified with the principles on which God is moving in grace; they are to characterise us in all our relations with our brethren. This would secure happy relations between all the saints, even if they have different measures of light and faith, and there would be no hindrance to our “with one accord, with one mouth” glorifying “the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ”. I think there is an intimation in this of saints being together as in assembly. The [p. 226] assembly is not formally mentioned; we must go to 1 Corinthians for that; but for saints with one accord and one mouth to glorify God is an assembly character of things. The mutual relations of the saints, and the attitude of their spirits one toward another, are to be so adjusted according to the spirit of Christ that there is nothing to hinder their united praise to God. It all has in view, not merely the peace and unity of the brethren, but what God will get in their united service of praise.
It is a serious thing to misrepresent God. Moses misrepresented God when he said, “Ye rebels”, and smote the rock, and it lost him the land. If God is to be rightly represented amongst His people, there must be this spirit of grace that does not think of pleasing self, but of the good of others.
Verse 4 is a helpful word as to the Old Testament being all written for our instruction. Much that is written there, though not apparently addressed to us, is “altogether for our sakes”, 1 Corinthians 9: 10. It is that “through endurance and through encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope”. The Scriptures keep what is of God before us. It is striking that it is “the God of endurance and of encouragement” who is spoken of here as giving us to be “like-minded one toward another, according to Christ Jesus”. What a God of endurance He is! He was bearing with the lack of knowledge and liberty on the part of His Jewish saints, and He would have His Gentile saints to be imbued with the same spirit towards them that He was exercising Himself.
There is encouragement also as well as endurance. He would encourage us to count upon His working in our brethren. The “hope” in verse 4 would be,
[p. 227] I think, in relation to our walking together. We are not to despair of the saints, for they are the subjects of divine working; we are always to be hopeful. See how hopeful Paul was even as to the Galatians! He was greatly grieved about them, and yet he says, “I have confidence as to you in the Lord, that ye will have no other mind”, Galatians 5: 10. And he tells us that love “hopes all things”. It is as recognising the place which saints have before God “according to Christ Jesus” that we can be hopeful about them. That is, we do not think of them according to the flesh, but according to their place by grace. A weak brother may not know his new status “according to Christ Jesus”, but it is the privilege of the strong to know it, and to regard him according to it. To make little of him would show that the strong did not understand his divine value any more than he did himself.
It may be said that there are many defects in the saints! But what are we working for? A natural man could point out defects: a spiritual man feels under obligation to serve in love that they may be removed. That is the spirit of grace, and it is to pervade the company of those who are “one body in Christ”. Divine encouragement would come in on that line.
The Scriptures give us the great principles of God’s ways in grace, and they show us the features of the spirit of Christ. They encourage us to move in accord with God and with Christ. On that line we may confidently expect divine support. We are to open our affections to one another, not to be repellent. Christ has received us to the glory of God, and it is according to that that we are to “receive ye one another”. This contemplates the saints as walking together — as, of course, all saints did at the beginning — according to the truth of the one Christian fellowship; it contemplates the whole company of those who are “one body in Christ”. They were not to hold one another at a distance, but to receive one another in the same affectionate grace with which the Christ had received them.
There are peculiar difficulties in the sorrowful conditions of the last days. Very many of our brethren do not become available to us in a practical way. There may be many believers in the town where we live whom we do not even know! It is a sad witness to the state of departure and ruin, and is to our common grief and shame. But our affections can still be open towards all saints, and we can rejoice if even a few become practically available to us on the principles laid down in 2 Timothy, an epistle which is specifically direction for us in the last days. While keeping our hearts open towards all saints, our associations have now to be adjusted on the principle of withdrawing from iniquity, separating from vessels to dishonour, following righteousness, faith, love, peace, and calling upon the Lord out of a pure heart. In the present state of things we can only receive practically those who become available, but the fact that is says, “receive ye one another”, makes it possible for even two saints to act upon it. Our great exercise should be to walk together as brethren according to the truth, so that no one could say that he had a divine reason for not walking with us. If saints walk together according to the truth, they will rejoice to receive all the brethren who desire to walk with them in the same path, and all the brethren [p. 229] ought to be exercised so to walk. What is in view in the scripture before us is that there may be no hindrance to a united note of praise from the saints as come together.
How helpful would the spirit of all this be to the weak brother! He would be strengthened by the grace which he found in his brethren, and his weakness eliminated; he would learn Christian liberty. The spirit of consideration for the good of others, and a willingness to exercise self-restraint, rather than stumble a weak brother, are beautiful features of the grace of God in His people.
We ought to be profoundly moved by the thought of the blessed service of Christ. He has served the circumcision “for the truth of God, to confirm the promises of the fathers”. He has done everything to establish the truth of God, and to confirm the promises, so that not one word that God said to Israel might fail of accomplishment. And He has served the Gentiles too, so that there might be a united and harmonious note of praise going up to God from both Jew and Gentile. “For this cause I will confess to thee among the nations, and will sing to thy name. And again he says, Rejoice, nations, with his people. And again, Praise the Lord, all ye nations, and let all the peoples laud him”. What a beautiful and divine melody! Christ Himself singing to God’s Name among the Gentiles! I understand that the word “sing” in verse 9 is a word which suggests singing to a musical accompaniment. The blessed Christ of God has served the Gentiles so that their hearts might become the musical accompaniment to His own singing. Now are we going to allow anything in our spirits that will bring a jarring note to [p. 230] spoil that wondrous music? Think of an orchestra of praise so glorious that Christ Himself is its Leader! And am I going to allow something in my spirit some bad feeling, some personal resentment — that will be a jarring note? Let all such things be banished in the power of divine grace!
“Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that ye should abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit”. God is the God of hope, and He would have His people to abound in hope. He is going to carry through without fail every purpose of His love in connection with those whom He has called. The Holy Spirit would give us power to hold it all in our souls as a matter of hope. God is going to carry His work through with all His saints, and is going to secure all that is in His purpose. If we abound in hope, as having before us what God has before Him, it will keep us bright, and sustain us even in the presence of all the weakness and departure that have manifested themselves in the Christian profession. Paul never wrote in a more encouraging strain than in 2 Timothy. When John wrote his Gospel the assemblies were in a sad state, but he wrote about the Son of God, and the Father, and the Comforter, and about the thoughts of divine love in relation to those given by the Father to the Son. He is a blessed example of one filled with all joy and peace in believing, and abounding in hope.
We come in verse 14 to a beautiful setting forth of the normal fruit of the glad tidings. Looking at saints as subjects of divine calling and grace, as the work of God, Paul was persuaded concerning them that they were full of goodness and knowledge. What a contrast with what is said of the natural man in [p. 231] chapter 3! The gospel comes to us as not having one feature of goodness about us, and it works such a miracle that we are filled with goodness and with all knowledge! If this is not realised in us as yet, it is at any rate an alluring prospect.
The goodness with which the saints, viewed normally, are filled, is intelligent goodness. There is the knowledge of good and evil now with complete freedom from the evil, so that nothing but goodness remains in activity! What wondrous knowledge has one who knows spiritually what is taught in this epistle! He knows himself — man — and he knows God as revealed in righteous grace; he knows the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Spirit as indwelling; he knows the brethren as one body in Christ. As thus “filled with all knowledge” there is ability to admonish one another. Every part of the truth that is spiritually impressed on our hearts and minds is to be put in circulation among the brethren. We always need admonishing; it is a putting in mind of things known — not the teaching of what is unknown. This very letter I take to be a good example of admonishing. Paul does not write as to persons who did not know; he assumes all through that they knew what he was speaking about. But he puts them in mind of what they knew, so that the power of it might work intelligently in their souls to bring forth a result for God. Things are often presented in the apostles’ writings, not as assuming that the saints do not know them, but on the ground that they do. We can hopefully admonish one another because the truth of what we speak is known to the brethren, though perhaps it may be in danger of getting dimmed. The tendency of things around us is to dim what is [p. 232] of God in our souls; hence the need of continual admonition. A brother or sister has often called my attention to what I know in a way that has brought it home with freshness to me, and set me a little more in the good of it. There is preservative power in admonishing; we ought to speak more to one another of the things which we know. We are sometimes reserved because we feel that brothers or sisters know very well the thing which we have on our minds. But that is no reason for not saying it to them! It is a wonderful privilege to belong to a community where every one continually brings before us the precious things of God. There is preservative and stimulating power in such activities. God is always giving us impressions; He gives you one and me another, and if we communicate these impressions to each other we shall both benefit. We should not hesitate to speak of things that are on our minds; they are given to us to be put into circulation.
Paul had a special measure of grace given to him; he had an official place as “minister of Christ Jesus to the nations”. He was not taking too much upon him in addressing himself thus to the Gentiles. He was serving out in holy dignity all the divine wealth that was in God’s Anointed Man, Christ Jesus. But he ever had in mind the result for God, so that he carried out his ministry as “a sacrificial service”. What he had before him was that those of the nations should be brought and offered up as in Christ Jesus, sanctified by the Holy Spirit, and thus “acceptable” to God. Paul had something to boast of in Christ Jesus in relation to God. He carried on the message of God’s glad tidings as “a sacrificial service” in view of the result for God. It was a holy and priestly [p. 233] character of service. Just as Aaron waved the cleansed and purified Levites before Jehovah as an offering for holy service, Numbers 13, so would Paul bring those of the nations for God’s holy service and pleasure. His object was that those of the nations might be an acceptable offering for God. This is the priestly side of gospel service. Paul could say that he served God in his spirit in the glad tidings of His Son; Romans 1: 9. There is a priestly character about that. Paul’s public position was that he was the official administrator of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles, but in his own spirit he was in a priestly attitude, thinking of the result for God. The object of the glad tidings is that there may be a company of persons in Christ Jesus, sanctified by the Holy Spirit, wholly apart morally from the flesh, acceptable to God for His holy service.
As a levitical company we have to carry the tabernacle of testimony, Each Levite had his appointed work, but they were a united band carrying one testimony. Service is, in one sense, an individual matter, but God would impress upon us that all service is to be rendered as part of one united whole. The name Levi means “United”. There is no such thing as independency in service. My individual service is part of one great whole. “The planter and the waterer are one”; we might say they are two, but God says one. The evangelist, the prophet, the pastor and teacher, are one; they are unified as being of Levi. Each one has his own line; each Levite has his own bit to carry, but each one carries it with a deep conviction that he is carrying a bit of a united testimony, and that it needs all the other bits to make it complete. Individuality in service [p. 234] has been sometimes pressed to the point of independence, so that servants have become free-lances, each doing what was right in his own eyes, and not regarding the necessity for unity with all the other servants.
As a united band each appreciates what the others are doing, and does not get unduly taken up with his own service. Brethren walking in the Spirit think more highly of others’ gifts than they do of their own; it affords genuine pleasure to see another doing what we feel we cannot do ourselves. It is a delight to see service rendered to the saints. Chapter 12 would guard us against being copyists of each other’s service, for it reminds us that each has his God-given measure of faith. I only really have divine support as I pursue the line for which God has dealt faith to me. No doubt we are all peculiarly impressed by those who have been made a blessing to us, but it does not follow that their service is to be the pattern of ours. God does not duplicate His servants. He gives a distinct measure of faith to each, and each has to fill up his own measure.
Paul now speaks of his own labours in their widely extended character. Pursuant to his great commission he had laboured over a vast area, and he could say that he had “fully preached the glad tidings of the Christ”. He had a wonderful impression in his soul of what subsisted for men in God’s Anointed Man, and he had fully preached it over an immense tract of country. There is such an infinite fulness in God’s Anointed Man that it is impossible to exhaust it. However widely it is published, the point can never be reached when the supplies run short. Paul announced Christ, as he tells the Colossians, and admonished and taught every man, to the end that [p. 235] he might present every man perfect in Christ. Every man, everywhere, may be made perfect in Christ! What a glad tidings! Paul’s excessive labours had so far hindered him from going to Rome, but his heart now turned thitherward, and even reached out farther west to Spain. His great desire in the service of the glad tidings was to go to those who had not heard of Christ. The true evangelist longs to reach those who know nothing of Christ. Paul did not wish to build on another’s foundation; he preferred to begin, if we may so say, with raw material. It, might be said that there is not much of that in a country like England now! Well, in spite of a kind of traditional Christianity, it is surprising how little idea people have of Christ as God’s Anointed Man. Many people around us have no idea of the true character of God’s present approach to men in the glad tidings. They are proper subjects of the evangelist’s work; he goes forth having this in his heart, “To whom there was nothing told concerning him, they shall see; and they that have not heard shall understand”. It would often be helpful for the preacher to assume that he has at least one in his congregation who is entirely ignorant of the true grace of God, and for him to address himself to that one, that his eyes might be opened to see how the blessed God is presenting Himself to His fallen and sinful creatures in the glad tidings concerning His Son. It was an amazing favour when God sent His Son into the world, His own Anointed One. Then the death of Christ is the most stupendous fact in the history of the world. It would not be too much to say that it is the most stupendous fact in the history of eternity! And now Christ Jesus, the risen and glorified Man — with every [p. 236] thought of divine pleasure and blessing substantiated in Him — is presented to men as God’s salvation. So that all men may come into the present favour of God as blessed in that glorious Man for the delight of the heart of God. Is it not surpassingly wonderful!
The apostle does not appeal to the saints at Rome to make a contribution for the poor saints in Jerusalem. He had appealed to those at Corinth, and also to the assemblies in Galatia, his own personal labours amongst them having given him a claim upon their affections. But to those at Rome, where he had not laboured, he does not appeal in the same way, but he tells them how other Gentile assemblies had been “well pleased to make a certain contribution”. And he adds, “They have been well pleased indeed, and they are their debtors; for if the nations have participated in their spiritual things, they ought also in fleshly to minister to them”. It is a very fine touch, bringing to bear upon the saints at Rome a sense of their obligation in regard to their Jewish brethren, but doing it with that admirable delicacy which is so characteristic of Paul. Not saying, You ought to do so and so, but telling them what others had done, and observing that it was only right that they should do what they had done. God would not have us, as Gentiles, to forget that the spiritual things in which we participate belonged primarily, according to promise, to the Jew. We are “their debtors”. It was the Lord Himself who said, “Salvation is of the Jews”, John 4: 22. To remember this is a wholesome check upon Gentile pride.
The contribution of the Gentile assemblies to those at Jerusalem had great spiritual importance also from another point of view. It was the truth of the one [p. 237] body in a practical shape. The fact that those of the nations should be contributing to Jews, and that Jews should be thankfully accepting it as the fruit of God’s grace to the nations, was a practical sealing of Paul’s labours and ministry. It was the evidence in a tangible shape that those of the nations were “joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of his promise in Christ Jesus by the glad tidings”, Ephesians 3: 6. Nothing but the working of grace in the Gentiles could have made them realise what debtors they were to the Jews, and nothing but the same powerful working in the Jews could have made them willing to own the grace which had made those of the nations “joint heirs, and a joint body, and joint partakers of his promise in Christ Jesus by the glad tidings”. The difficulty was probably greater on the side of the Jew than it was on the side of the Gentile. Every bit of Jewish pride would rise up against receiving it, so Paul wished the saints to strive with him in prayer that there might be grace in Jerusalem to receive it. A manifestation of grace is not always appreciated. Paul had secured the activity of Gentile affections towards the Jew; now his concern was that Jewish affections should be appreciative. It was perhaps more difficult for the Jew to receive than for the Gentile to give. It meant the recognition by the Jew of the work of God amongst the nations, and that those of the nations could now be their benefactors. Would the Jew gratefully receive the bounty of God from Gentile hands? Paul wished to go to the capital of the Gentile world with the joy in his heart of knowing that the divine bond had been cemented. Hence he asks the saints in Rome to strive together with him in prayers for him to God,
[p. 238] not only that he might be saved from those that did not believe, but also “that my ministry which I have for Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints”.
Anything that contributes to the practical establishment between saints of divine bonds is worth a great deal to secure. The apostle linked up the Roman saints with himself in these truly assembly exercises. It was important, in view of universal assembly conditions, that all feelings of estrangement and distance between Jewish and Gentile brethren should be removed. And in principle this applies to every divergence and disagreement between saints. Natural influences and personal feelings come in and cause estrangements. They can only be got rid of by the grace of God being bestowed on both parties; He must work on both sides of the breach. Very often sufferings and distresses are permitted — like the poverty at Jerusalem — to prepare the way for differences to be removed, and for the saints to be more closely knit together. We have to endeavour to keep the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace, but this can only be done “with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love”, Ephesians 4: 2, 3. The fact is that often we get occupied with what we regard as wrong things done by others, and get into strong feelings about it, when perhaps the Lord has permitted the circumstances just as a test of the state of our own spirits. And if we begin by being faithful with ourselves, we should have to admit that our own spirits were wrong. God always comes in for a self-judged person, and it is on the line of self-judgment that breaches are healed.
“But I know that, coming to you, I shall come in [p. 239] the fulness of the blessing of Christ”. Paul was a divinely prepared vessel of ministry, made competent by God to carry the fulness of the blessing of Christ. His saying that he would come in “the fulness of the blessing of Christ” was a hint that there was more — that he had not put everything in his letter to them. It leaves room for Colossians and Ephesians. Paul was minister of the glad tidings and minister of the assembly; the word of God was completed in his ministry, and God wrought in him in power that “the fulness of the blessing of Christ” might come out in ministry, so that the saints might stand in the good of it. To the Corinthians he had to say, “Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your affections”, 2 Corinthians 6: 12.
What a privilege the saints had in being permitted to have partnership with Paul in his assembly exercises and service! He beseeches them to pray for him “by our Lord Jesus Christ” — what an appeal is that to those who love Him! — “and by the love of the Spirit” — love from a divine source, counted on as being in the saints as indwelt by the Spirit. Feeling and praying under the influence of such motives, there would be conditions suitable to the God of peace. “And the God of peace be with you all. Amen”.