One thing I find myself doing a great deal is attempting to read scripture in a way that removes 2000 years of religious pomposity from the equation. Maybe Paul did speak like a Catholic encyclical; but then again, maybe he was just hoping to be understood. The fact that he wrote such terribly long sentences only underlines this for me: stream of consciousness works better when people can follow what you are saying.
Case in point, the opening of the letter we call ‘Romans’:
Through him we received grace and apostleship to call all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith for his name’s sake. And you also are among those Gentiles who are called to belong to Jesus Christ.
Romans 1:5-6 (NIV)
To my point, this is only part of a sentence in the Greek, which runs from verse 1-7. And I admit it kind of makes sense, but by the time you string it together with the rest of the Greek sentence it just sounds self-important; which is not who Paul was at all.
So let me give you an alternative: I absolutely do not insist on any of this; but personally I find it far more meaningful, not to mention something I can respond to personally. And it doesn’t lose its definition if I put it back in its very long original sentence. Here is the literalist version:
“…through whom we received a commission [a legal grant] and a send-off into answering the prayer [or even ‘answering a knock on the door’] of faith on behalf of His name amongst all the nations [or ‘Gentiles’], amongst whom you also are gathered of Jesus Christ…”
We can smooth this out and put it back in the sentence:
Paul a servant of Jesus Christ, summoned as someone to be sent, marked down for the reward that comes for carrying good news from God, which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the sacred writings concerning His Son, the one born as the seed of David according to the flesh, the one identified as Son of God in power by the Spirit of Holiness from His resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our master, through whom we received an assignment and our despatch to go answer faith on behalf of His name in every nation, amongst whom you also are gathered to Jesus Christ, all you who are beloved of God there in Rome, called to be saints: grace to you and peace from God, Father of us and of our master Jesus Christ.
And to make my central point in the bold portion above, perfectly clear: Paul isn’t sent in this version to bring people to obedience but he goes to respond to their faith. If that seems an alien idea then go back and read Jesus telling His disciples to find the man of peace in a village; and any one of a bazillion missionary testimonies about their (the missionary’s) surprise when they reached the place where the unreached were waiting, only to hear them saying some version of, “oh, you are here at last – we were beginning to wonder when you would come…”
You see, God’s plan is well laid, and His enemy is already crushed. No bullying is required: people are looking for God and calling out, even when they don’t quite realise it. As a very proud witchdoctor kind of person said to my colleague and I in Indonesia some years ago, when I asked him what he actually wanted of us (since he had just spent over an hour telling us how useless Christians were):
“I want to be saved, of course!”
Well, that will not be a problem, sir…
Seeing the Kingdom 