Paul's letter to the Romans begins by establishing his identity as a "bond slave" of Jesus Christ, a term that carries significant weight given the Roman context of slavery. The sermon contrasts the despised status of slaves in Roman society with the voluntary, loving servitude of a "bond slave" to Christ, exemplified by Jesus himself and by Paul's own dedication. This concept of servanthood, particularly the willing sacrifice of one's life for the master, is presented as the core of Christian discipleship and the key to true greatness in God's kingdom. The sermon concludes by emphasizing that this devoted relationship with Christ, rooted in love and obedience, is the foundation for understanding and living out the gospel, which was promised throughout the Old Testament Scriptures.
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talking about how we get confused and get what it's supposed to do and so forth. I came here this morning assuming I wasn't going to sleep. I didn't get enough of the sleep. I didn't put a tie on. So I just hand them the golden age and the rest of you. Well, let's turn to the book of Romans. Last night we talked about the outline. And now let's dig into the book of Romans. Do it, the Lord, that you say to us, should we open up what it says? I'll touch this, Lord. We do marvel at the great grace that you're coming here to die for us.
We marvel at that. Why? Why did we do it? We know it's because of love. Oh, the love that grew salvation. Oh, the grace that brought it down to the likes of us. We thank you for it once again this morning. We thank you for your word. And we just ask that you keep your heart to your word. And Jesus' name, Amen. Brother Don talked about a, you know, brother, wife, daughter on a bicycle, I admit you remember. You know, when you get old, you think of things way back. And I was a skitter about, well, whatever. It was on a Sunday and dad and mother had gone some breaks Sunday afternoon. And dad had a bicycle.
He rode the bicycle quite a bit, especially during the, I grew up during the Great Depression, having been born in twenty-five. And he had his own bicycle, which we were not supposed to use. We had his own bike, except I didn't have one. Well, it was Sunday, and dad and mother were gone, so I took dad's bike. And then had it back in its place. By the time he got back, everything would be fine, except my brother and the neighborhood son, He decided to race down a quite a large hill. It was a race. Well, halfway down that hill, the handlebars came off of that bike. If you ever felt out of control, you know, handlebars up in the air and couldn't control the bike, went off the road, and my brother and the neighbor boy was laughing to heart, and off the road into the ditch, and I went against the tree, and as I stopped, I couldn't hold the bicycle up.
My foot runs through the Trump wheel spoke. Not only that I have to fix the handlebars, but all those folks anyway. Well, be sure your sins will find you out, and Dad did find it out, and it wasn't good, but I learned a good lesson. Always do what Father says. Romans chapter one and verse one. Let's read the first five verses. Paul, a servant. of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, which he had promised before by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures, concerning his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead, by whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations, for his name.
Now I'd like to have us turn to the last chapter of Romans. We just want to notice something here. Let's have us turn to the last chapter. You might keep your finger here. Let's turn to the last chapter and we're going to read the last four verses just so we notice something here. Turn to chapter sixteen and we begin at verse twenty-four, the last section, the benediction. And I want you to notice The same words recurring here, the same, many of the same words that we read in the first five verses. Friend, in such words as God, Jesus Christ, our Lord, gospel, prophets, holy scriptures, power, obedience of faith, and all nations.
This is all repeated in these last four verses. We ought to tell us something. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, verse twenty-four of chapter sixteen, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, be with you all. Amen. Now to him that is of power to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began, but now is made manifest and by the scriptures of the prophets according to the commandment of the everlasting God made known unto all nations for the obedience of faith. To God only wise be glorious through Jesus Christ forever. Amen. Let me give you an idea when we begin and end on the same note, we get an idea of what the book is about.
Our God, the end of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, the gospel, the prophets, the scriptures, power, the obedience of faith, it begins and ends with the obedience of faith. All nations, it's for all nations. It's interesting, I remember that as I was studying this out. Paul a servant bond slave Paul a bond slave of Jesus Christ called to be an apostle let's just look at that word bond slave Paul was a bond slave of Jesus Christ he had been a slave to Judaism But now he was a bond, you know, we're all slaves.
Slavery was never abolished. Maybe we did in this country, but God never abolished it. We're all slaves to something. And either to the devil or to ourselves or to the world, whatever, to sin, to the law. But we're to be bond slaves of the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul was, he was sold out to the Lord Jesus Christ. That's an interesting thing that Paul, a Roman, would be writing to the Romans and calling himself a slave. There were about six million slaves in Rome at that time. No Roman citizen, by the way, was a slave. Slaves were conquered people.
Part of the booty of war, part of the spoiled was to bring home slaves. And so Roman citizens had everything done by slaves. And no Roman citizen was a slave. A slave was not something that someone wanted to be. You didn't, you know, when your children were born, you didn't hope they would grow up to be a slave. And it was for conquered people. There were several things that Romans were never crucified, by the way. Fact of the matter is, Cicero said that a Roman should never even witness a crucifixion, shouldn't even think about crucifixion. It was not for a Roman citizen. When the Apostle Paul was executed, it was by a sword, by decapitation.
not by crucifixion. That was only for slavery, non-Romans. Well, slavery was not for Romans either. But Paul was a bond slave. We'll go back to Exodus just for a moment to see what a bond slave really was, but just to again think about this matter of slavery. You know, Alexander the Greats, for instance, We know something about Alexander the Great. And it didn't take him long to conquer nations. I mean, just a matter of days sometimes. But when he conquered Tyre, it took seven months.
And he was so perturbed by that that it took so long. They were so hard to get to. Being on a little island out in the ocean, they're just offshore. And so they... you recall they took down the city and they made a causeway out there and they straighted clean like the top of a rock according to prophecy and made a causeway out there and they took the island finally and and Alexander the Great was was so unhappy about that that that he not only sold all of us all of the citizens there into slavery but he did he he would name them one way another cut off a hand cut off a foot cut off their ear so that everyone who met one of those slaves would know that they had met Alexander the Great.
The Jews were very proud, of course. They didn't want to be slaves. And of course, Roman made many of them slaves. A Jewish prayer went something like this. I thank thee, O God, that thou didst not create me to be a slave. It was a despised thing. Servanthood was not something that... that anyone's desire to be. The thing was to be served, to be a Roman citizen, be served, certainly not to be a slave. Well, then along comes our Lord, and he's called Jehovah's Servant, and he lived like a servant. The brother was pointing out he was Jehovah's Servant. He's spoken as Jehovah's Servant in the Old Testament, and he says to himself in the New Testament, and along comes Paul and says, first thing he says, call a bond slave of Jesus Christ.
A very unusual language. Very unusual language. We might just turn to Matthew twelve, just for a second here, to point out, we're all familiar with it. You know, I used to wonder why it was that when the Lord would perform miracles so many times, you would say, don't tell anybody, just don't breathe it around. And I've heard several explanations why. and none of them really satisfied me until one day I was reading here in Matthew twelve and it struck me this is the reason why and the Lord gives the reason why he acted that way and so let's turn to Matthew twelve and verse fourteen then the Pharisees went out and held a counsel against him how they might destroy him but when Jesus knew it he withdrew himself from there and great multitudes followed him and he healed them all and charged them that they should not make him known that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet saying behold my servant behold my slave you see slaves don't get any no they don't get any thanks they don't get any it's interesting you know did you know that the the people who had slaves didn't thank
them they didn't reward them they didn't thank them they just treat them like a like a piece of machinery the fact the matter is Aristotle said that a slave is a tool with a soul in it. Just a tool with a soul in it. That's all. And so here he is. He's acting in his true role. He says, this won't say a word. He says, slaves, don't get me a claim. They were getting notoriety. They were getting me thanks. They just do what they're supposed to do. That's what he said, don't tell them about this. It's kind of interesting. Our Lord was a slave. Of course, that didn't settle with the Jews. It didn't settle with the Romans. It didn't settle with anybody.
Who wants to be a slave? It came to Jehovah's servant. Again, let's turn to Mark. Let's turn to Mark ten, and we're familiar with this too, but let's turn to Mark ten in verse forty-five. Mark ten in verse forty-five. And remember, this is, excuse me, this is when the... When the sons of the devil, he wanted to, the mother came and asked, you know, just a little thing like mothers do for their sons, you know, could I have one son sitting on the right, one on the left? And the Lord is explaining that, you know, this is really not the attitude you should have.
And then in verse forty-five, he says, for even the son of man, God himself, manifested in the flesh, came not to be served, not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many. We can apply this whole thing to ourselves except the ransom for many. We are to give our life, which is like a slave. A slave didn't have a life in his own. He just gave it to the master. And of course the bond slave was one who enjoyed doing that. He did it for love. And if we go back to Exodus, and time goes by real fast, isn't it? If we go back to Exodus, Just very quickly notice what a bond slave really was.
We're probably all familiar with this, and yet good speakers say you never assume anything, so we just go back. And we'll notice that the Ten Commandments were given in the twentieth chapter, and I love to see the progression, to see the order in the Word of God. Right after giving the Ten Commandments in chapter twenty, we go to verse twenty-four. Notice the first thing that God gives orders about after getting the Ten Commandments. He says, an altar of earth, shalt thou make them to me, and so forth. He gives the direction how to build an altar. Why the altar? He's just given the Ten Commandments. The people have said, we will do whatever you say. God has now built an altar.
He says, he knew that they would break the commandments, and then it has to bring an offering. And then to me, it's beautiful to see that the next thing we have, is a beautiful picture of the one that the offering spoke of. Now these, starting with verse one of chapter twenty one, now these are the ordinances which thou shalt set before them. If thou buy an Hebrew service, six years shall he serve, and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by himself, he shall go out by himself. If he was married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master had given him a wife, and she have borne him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out by himself.
And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife and my children, I will not go out free, then his master shall bring him unto the judges, and he shall also bring him to the door, or unto the doorpost, and the master shall bore his ear through with an all, and he shall serve him forever. Now we have a difference in slaves here. Some serve for six years and some serve forever. And the difference is one basic word, love. That's the difference. Now in our Christian family, we have those two kinds of servants.
Some are six-year servants and some are servants forever. The question is which one are you and me? The Apostle Paul was a forever servant. In that same context, I'd like to have us turn to Luke XVII just for a second. We're not going to get very far in Romans anyway, so I'm not going to try to cover a lot of ground, but Luke XVII, I believe it is. Yes, Luke XVII. And here I think we have a contrast between those two kinds of servants, just so we can kind of judge ourselves, which one am I? I suppose we all want to be the bond slave, don't we?
But here we have a description here of a six-year servant, not the bond slave. Beginning in verse seven of chapter seventeen, but which of you having a servant following or feeding cattle will say unto him when he has come from the field, go and sit down to eat? And will not rather say unto him, make ready that which I may stop and gird thyself and serve me till I have eaten and drunk. And afterwards thou shalt eat and drink. And I used to wonder at this. Verse nine, does he, here's the Lord Jesus telling this story. He said, does he thank that servant? Because he did the things that were commanded him.
He said, I think not. He said, he doesn't thank him. And you know something? They didn't thank slaves. They never showed appreciation. Today they have slaves over in that neck of the woods. And that's the way they treat them. I have an article. I don't have it with me here, but I have it with me in my thing. And I should leave a copy for you. The name of the article is, I don't want to be a servant. Very enlightening. It tells about how slaves are in that part of the world today. And they treat them just like they used to. They don't thank them. They treat them like a piece of furniture. They don't provide for them. And so the Lord says, he's just telling it how it is. He says, do they thank them? No, you don't thank slaves. Uh-uh. No, he didn't thank them. Verse ten, so you also, when you shall have done all, listen to this, all those things which are commanded you, say, we are unprofitable servants.
We have done that which was our duty to do. Now, what kind of talk is this? Well, this servant is only a six-year servant. Now, the other kind are the kind that you don't have to command them to do things. The Lord did not command Mary, for instance, to come with a box, to break the box with an appointment, cost a year's labor. He didn't ask you to do that. It was spontaneous. She wanted to do that. It was not a command. She was not a six-year slave. Remember David when he was in the cave of Adulam, and he had these mighty men around him, and he just kind of said under his breath, you know, It would be great to have a drink of water from the well there just inside the gate in my hometown of Zephyr.
I can't go there now because the Philistines possess the town so high to have a drink of water from the well. There were three mighty men who were not ordinary servants. They were bond slaves. And all they knew is that their Lord would be delighted if they would go and get a drink of water for him. No command. And of course, David had broke him up, didn't it, when they brought that water. He said, this is too much devotion to me. I'll just pour it out to the Lord. That's the kind of servant that the Lord is looking for.
That's the kind of servant Paul was. That's the kind of a slave he was. So Paul begins Romans by first of all telling us his relationship and his attachment to his Lord. Is it any wonder that Paul was chosen by our Lord to be the instrument to write the weightiest document ever handed down to man about this very subject of our Lord coming as a barn slave? It's interesting how the Lord picks his servants to do certain things.
He had the perfect one to write this book to us. Christ was primary to him. It really all depends, I believe. The longer I walk with the Lord, the more I believe it really basically depends on our relationship to him. We can know all the truth. The fact of the matter is, Paul says that, I mean, the Holy Spirit says that through Paul in first Corinthians, you can have it all. You can know all the mysteries. You can preach like even better than Don Wellborn.
That's getting pretty good. I don't know if anybody does that. Anyway, you can have it all, but you don't have love. Praise God Don has it. He bubbles over with it. But if you don't have love, he says, it's no good. It's not as though there's going to be hindered. He doesn't say, if you don't have love, your ministry will be hindered. He says, you're nothing. Absolutely nothing. So number one, we have to be head over heels in love with the Lord. That's easy to do. I don't know how we can be any other way to be occupied with Him. You have to love Him. What else? He calls for nothing. fact matter is when it gets to Romans twelve one Paul says I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercy that all these mercies of God that we've been talking about for eleven chapters I beseech you there's only one thing you can really do offer your body as a bond slave offer your body a living sacrifice that's what a bond slave is a living sacrifice it's all for the master our Lord Jesus Christ was was our best example of that.
As Jehovah's servant, he offered up everything to God. Everything was for God. You see, greatness in God's kingdom is measured in terms of servanthood. That's where greatness is. It's kind of interesting that in God's kingdom, up is down. You go down if you want to go up. He that exalts himself shall be a base. He that humbles himself shall be exalted. If you want to be somebody, get as low as you possibly can. Interesting, isn't it? It's the meek that inherit the earth, not the bold ones that go out and try to possess the earth. It's the meek. And of course, that word meek, that's really referring first of all to our Lord Jesus Christ.
Who was more meek than our Lord Jesus Christ? Whoever stooped so low, whoever was so high that he had so far that he could stoop. The rest of us are down in the gutter to begin with. How can you stoop very low when you're down in the gutter? Like they say down in Texas, you're as low as a snake's belly on a wagon track. You can't get much lower. Well, that is not good, I'm not sure. But anyway, we're right down there. It shouldn't be too hard for us to stoop, should it? Then Paul says, speaking of his credentials, he says, first of all, number one, he says, a bond servant, a bond slave of Jesus Christ.
called to be an apostle. Here's his authority. Verse is relationship with Christ. His attachment to Christ. Now his authority from Christ. And that word apostle means one who is sent by authority with a commission. One who is sent by authority with a commission. I understand that our word missionary is simply the Latin form of the Greek apostle. Is that right, Don? Amen. Okay? And so we send apostles, of course, it's in a lower case, I'm sure, than the original twelve, but it's still the idea of someone who is sent. The secular Euclid in those days was a representative of the emperor.
Apostle was in a secular language. When the emperor sent somebody, it'd be like an ambassador, I suppose. He was a representative of the emperor. One qualification, of course, necessary to be an apostle in the original sense of Christ was to have seen the risen Lord. And Paul says he saw him. He tells us that. In Acts nine, one to nine, and also in verse nine, one and two, he says, have I not seen the Lord? He was definitely an apostle. Then he says, he says, separated under the gospel of God. He was not just separated from the world, but he was separated too.
As a Pharisee, he had been separated to a life of strict observance of Jewish law and custom. You ever notice how Paul was, whatever he was, he was all there. He was all out, whatever he was. And praise the Lord, we need Christians like that, don't we? It'll pay a price. It'll stand there. Remember the church at Philadelphia? The Lord says, you have kept my, twice. He says, you've kept my word. You've kept my word. Now he says, I'm going to make you a pillar in my house. pillars stand there they keep the word no matter if everybody else falls they stand right there like one of David's mighty men when he in the Philistines was going to take over what are the kind of Philistines or itch or whatever they were going to take over a little plot of beings he stood right there and he killed them this little plot belongs to my king and it may not seem like much a little plot of a little plot of lintels but this little truth here is something as precious to my Lord and I will stand for that truth Now my hand will clave to the sword the word of God.
Nobody takes this little plot of beans. It seems like a little plot of beans to some people, doesn't it? And I can identify with my brother Don as he talks about how some of these precious things are just, you know, brushed aside. But to our Lord, it's like David was a drink of water. They're precious to him. They bring more honor to the Lord. And so let the numbers go someplace else if they want to. It's okay. We didn't have long to be here anyway. Let us stand by the word of God. Paul was a separated man. Separated to the gospel of God. Notice it's the gospel of God.
It originated with God and not men. It's the gospel of God. Gabeline says the gospel is the highest and best of God's revelation. We look into creation. We look into a lot of things, marvelous things. But the highest and best of God's revelation is the gospel. I believe that. And God appreciates it so much that he puts it first. It comes right in the first verse. To him it's very precious. Very precious. He authored it. He paid the terrible price of it. And nobody appreciates it more.
As we just sung, oh the love that drew salvation from man. Oh, the grace that brought it down to man. It is all God's idea. And God paid the price. And then we read in verse two, which he had promised before by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures. This gospel is a promise from Almighty God. When God makes a promise, we can depend on it. Almighty God made the promise. He began making that promise way back in the Garden of Eden. He promised Eve, didn't he? But see the seed of the woman. God made the promise. And when God makes the promise, that's as good as having the real thing.
I think it was Ian Blakelock said, he said, Eden was lost, but not God. We lost Eden, but we have God and his promise. More important than Eden, right? Eden was a wonderful place, but. We have something better than Adam and Eve have had. We have God and his promise and we have the gospel. And he says that it was promised before by his prophets and the Holy Scriptures. And he's serving notice here that we're going to hear a lot about the Old Testament, a lot about the Holy Scriptures. Eighty-seven times, we find eighty-seven references from fourteen Old Testament books here in the book of Romans.
Paul does not quote the New Testament here. He didn't have much of a New Testament at that time. He had written part of it. He had written first and second Thessalonians, I believe it was. And whatever. But Paul says it's all promise. It's all of it. And we're going to read a lot about the scriptures in Romans concerning the gospel. In Galatians, he says, the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles through faith preached before the gospel to Abraham, saying, In thee shall all the nations of the earth be blessed. That's the gospel, Paul says. In thee, in Abraham, in his seed, shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.
Where did we get this Bible? Abraham's seed. We would not have this precious book if Abraham's people had not carefully written it down and preserved it and rewrote it and saw to it that it was kept and we wouldn't have our Savior if it weren't through the blessing of Abraham our Savior one of his descendants yes he says all the nation all the world will be blessed through you Abraham preaching the gospel Paul says that was the gospel he preached to Abraham Our Lord said in Psalm forty and verse seven concerning his first advent, he says, Lo, I come in the volume of the book it is written in the entire Old Testament, in the volume of the book it is written in me.
He said to the Jews, he said, You search the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life, and they are they which testify of me. And we remember in Luke twenty-four when he joined the two disciples on the way to It may have been Mr. and Mrs. Corpus. But in any case, he joined them. And it says that he began with Moses. And in all the scriptures, he expunged them to things concerning himself. Yes, God made his promises to us in the Old Testament. And then if we return just for a moment, how long should I go, Pop? At eleven thirty or eleven thirty?
Okay. Let's turn to Romans, excuse me, to First Corinthians fifteen, just for a moment and just notice there, and as I say, we're familiar with this, but we do, we are being fed, aren't we, by these words of our Lord. Notice what it says here in Romans fifteen, one, we'll read one through eight. Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I have preached unto you, which also you have received, and in which you stand, by which also you are saved, if you keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless you have believed in vain.
So I delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received, that Christ died for our sins, notice according to the Scriptures. And that he was buried and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures, this Old Testament scriptures. And he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve. After that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present time, but some are fallen asleep. After that he was seen of James, then of all the apostles, and last of all he was seen of me. have the proof that the scriptures have been fulfilled he died the points are made concerning the person of christ he died for our sins according to the scriptures and he rose again and he was seen he was buried he rose and he was seen and someone has pointed out that um that The resurrection is one of the best documented ancient records that we have.
We have much more proof of Christ's resurrection than we have of the fact that Julius Caesar lived or many other of the old timers. We have all of this proof that he actually was dead. He was buried. He was in the grave for three days. And he rose and was seen of many people, well documented. And we won't have time at this session to get into the resurrection and what that means to us, but perhaps next time we get together. So it's all in the Scriptures, it's all according to the Scriptures.
I just want to mention before we close that the Old Testament, by the way, I get this from A.T. Gibbs. And if you get a chance to read any of his writings, then of course you all do. And you know they're good. He was a great servant of the Lord. But he says this. He says that the Old Testament is characterized by three things. Unfulfilled prophecies. Unexplained ceremonies. And unsatisfied longings. Unfulfilled prophecies. Unexplained ceremonies. and unsatisfied longing. And the Lord Jesus Christ in person satisfied all those things.
He fulfills the prophecies, He makes those Old Testament ceremonies sparkle, doesn't He? And He satisfies our hearts. When you think of the fact that the Old Testament saints never had a clear conscience, it says that those sacrifices they brought did not clear their conscience. They just had a remembrance again each year. but we have an absolutely clear conscience. We read in Hebrews ten. What a marvelous age to live in. And I'm so excited to be living now because I know the Lord's going to return. You know, I used to be sure that he was going to return before I retire. I had planned to retire in a year and a half.
And I still think he's going to return before I retire. I hope he returns today. And there's no reason why he wouldn't return. We just hope he does. but the psalmist says, I shall be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness. Isn't that something we can all say? Well, I shall be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness. Well, thank you very much. We'll close with that.