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Salutation and Introduction.
The letter to the Romans commences with a prologue of 15 verses. The salutation at
the opening is similar to Greek letters as a whole, but Paul expands it to give fuller details
of himself than he usually does. In fact it is the weightiest of all his introductions:
"Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of
God, (which He had promised afore by His prophets in the holy Scriptures), concerning
His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, Which 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 of the dead" (1: 1-4).
The Apostle describes himself as a slave (doulos), a seeming paradox coming from
one who was the apostle of liberty! (Gal. 5: 1). Yet this description was profound truth,
for just as a human slave was the property of his owner in every respect, and completely
at his master's disposal, so Paul by redemption belonged to Christ. He was `not his own',
but "bought with a price" which was nothing less than the life and sacrificial death and
resurrection of the Son of God (I Cor. 6: 19, 20). Such a condition is likewise true of
every believer in Christ and these tremendous practical implications the Apostle sought to
impress upon all the members of the churches.
He was a "called apostle". There is no need for the extra words "to be" supplied by
the A.V. He had been set apart by God at his birth (Gal. 1: 5), even as Jeremiah (Jer. 1: 5)
and the risen Lord's words recorded in Acts 9: 15 confirmed this, "he (Paul) is a chosen
vessel unto Me, to bear My name before the Gentiles". In the earlier letter to the
Galatians, Paul had made it quite clear that his ministry was centred in the gospel of
God's grace, which the risen Christ had revealed to him quite independently of any
human source. It was not "after man" declared the Apostle, "I neither received it of man,
neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ" (Gal. 1: 11, 12). Not only
this, but it was the divine standard for all gospel preaching and still is, so much so that if
even an angel from heaven preached any other gospel, God's curse would be on him
(Gal. 1: 8, 9). This good news is explained in I Cor. 15: 1-4:
"Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you . . . . .
for I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received (i.e. from the risen Saviour),
how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures; and that He was buried, and
that He rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures."
The Scriptures here, refer to the O.T. and such passages as Isa. 53: 12 dealing with
Christ's sacrificial death, Psa. 16: 10 (quoted in Acts 2: 23-32), Jonah 1: 17 (referred
to in Matt. 12: 40), setting forth His resurrection make this clear. Moreover the epistle
to the Romans revolves round a verse in the prophet Habakkuk, "the just shall live by his
faith" (2: 4), and the tremendous implications of this verse are brought forth and
elaborated all through this letter.
This "good news" is "concerning His Son, Jesus Christ out Lord" (Rom. 1: 3). The
Lord Jesus Christ is central in this gospel and without Him it would be no gospel at all,
but just an empty shell. The word "gospel" is one of the commonest words used in