By J.D. Walt
Prayer of Consecration
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body as a holy and living sacrifice to you.
Jesus, We belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.
Scripture
For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved. As Scripture says, “Anyone who believes in him will never be put to shame.” For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
Romans 10:10–13 (NIV)
Consider This
Let’s remember what Paul is up to in these three chapters (9–11) if not the whole letter; okay, if not all his letters. Paul is doing what he has always been doing. He is doing what he was doing before Jesus came along. Paul is trying to bring Scripture to its fulfillment by building up the ancient people of God into a nation favored and blessed by God—through whom the whole world would be blessed. Paul is trying to spread scriptural holiness across the land so that the glory of God could be known in the world as the waters cover the seas.
In other words, Paul is trying to save the world.
But he’s not trying to do it through the government or some sort of globalizing movement. That was what Rome was up to (aka, the Pax Romana, the Roman peace). It was decidedly a “peace through strength” approach with Caesar as lord and king. You see, in those days (as in these) to say Jesus is Lord was not to express a warm and fuzzy pious spiritual sentiment. It was a seditious political declaration. Understand, though, the point was not to overthrow the government and take down Rome. The point was to sow the seeds of the gospel into tiny communities of people who would become seedbeds of great awakening—demonstration plots of the kingdom of Heaven on Earth.
Now, Paul’s method has dramatically changed since he met Jesus. He is now working to build up the very communities he was working to destroy before. He is trying to encourage the tiny community of Christians (aka the church Jesus is building) in Rome. Remember, we are talking about a hundred people or so in a city of a million.
Let’s remember something here, though. This is the long game. Paul is not building his churches to somehow stand against the gates of Rome. Jesus is building his church to withstand the gates of hell. Remember this day with Jesus at Caesarea Philippi?
“But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?”
Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”
Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. (Matt. 16:15–18)
It’s why Paul says this:
For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.
So how do you save the world? The same way you eat an elephant—one bite at a time. Paul’s first and major challenge here in Rome is that of uniting the Jews and the Gentiles into one big happy family under the lordship of Jesus Christ. The Jews seem to remain intractably stuck in a centuries-old ditch known as works-based righteousness. Paul is trying to bring them into the gospel of Jesus, which is faith-based righteousness. It is not a righteousness one earns as a right but receives as a gift. This is very difficult for self-sufficient and control-oriented people; then and now, Jewish and otherwise.
For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him,
Paul is bringing all the people to the foot of the cross, where the ground is level, at the feet of Jesus . . . where . . .
“Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”
Prayer
Abba Father! Thank you for the simple gospel who is your son, Jesus, our Messiah. Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. This means no one is left out or excluded. Holy Spirit would you impress on us the meaning of everyone? And would you teach me, again, what it means to “call on the name of the Lord”? I want this to become my way of life, calling on the name of the Lord. Praying in Jesus’s name, amen.