The Power of God
Romans 1:16-17:
16I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 17For in the gospel a righteousness from God is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last, just as it is written: “The righteous will live by faith.”
I am currently doing a course on Romans through Trinity Theological College and we’re discussing the broad themes of Romans on Sunday. And one of the things that struck me about Romans 1:16-17 during the discussion was that we rate power by what you can do.
For example, the US military machine is the most potent fighting force ever known to man. With nearly 1.5 million men and women in the regular forces, 850 000 reserve personnel and a budget of over half a trillion dollars annually, it is hard to imagine a force more capable. They are engaged in two full-scale wars and can still have dozens of large bases across the world AND defend their own turf. By any measure, they are a powerful. Similarly, the Hubble Space Telescope has allowed us to see things that Earth-based telescopes would have never achieved. It is a powerful telescope.
How does the power of God compare? What can God achieve? To begin with, he made the world just by speaking and everything fell into place with no dramas. Every atom, every star, everything went exactly where it should have; all with just a word. God created life from dust, he made the Sun stop, he’s parted the sea, he’s annihilated armies, he’s healed the sick and he’s raised the dead. None of those are easy. God knows everything, sees everything, is all powerful and is omni-present.
Yet, out of all of that, Paul says that the gospel is the power of God in Romans 1, something he repeats in 1 Corinthians. What an odd thing to say is powerful! A message of a guy who died a traitor’s death, with no friends, in some backwater province of the Roman empire. How pathetic! That’s not really powerful at all you we could say. But what does it achieve?
It is the salvation of all who believe. Now that’s powerful! To turn rebels who hate God into children of God, who serve and worship him, is no mean feat. Barack Obama would give his right arm to be able to turn al-Qaeda from merciless insurgents into trusted allies; to be able to win over Osama bin Laden to the American way.
Yet God has done that to us through Jesus Christ. We can now, by faith, become the children of God through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. No power compares to that!
I am super impressed by your skill with words… For all we argue about this conversation its this blog that convinces me more! Keep up the good work!!