There
were some challenges getting started today. My ride to the venue for the
classes was a little later than anticipated, so that put us close on time. I
arrived just before the 7:45am starting time for the 15-minute period of
prayer. Once there, we found that we were missing the cords for the projector
and a few other things. But we pressed on and passed out notebooks to all
students with an outline of Romans, sheets with the full text of Romans printed
in parallel columns with NKJV and ASV side by side and notebook paper on the
facing page to facilitate easier note taking. I appreciate Angie, Rylie and
Shea Legg for all of their work in assembling the notebooks.
Despite
the challenges, the class began promptly at 8am as promised. Given the tendency
for almost nothing to get started on time, I thought this was a major
accomplishment by those hosting the class as well as the participants. This
happened in our Hebrews classes last May as well, so it is possible for things
to run on schedule here! In the morning session, we covered the introduction as
well as Romans 1 and half of Romans 2. In the introduction, we discussed the
difficulty of the book, as well as the writer’s use of the Old Testament
wherein he assumes both a detailed knowledge of the OT text as well as the
chronology of events.
We then
launched into the text, dealing with Paul’s introductory comments wherein he
note the epistle concerns the “obedience of faith” and saw that he ends the
book with the same statement in the closing words of chapter 16. The rest of
the morning was spent in showing the condemnation of the Gentile world as being
guilty of sin as well as the beginning of the same condemnation with regards to
the Jews. We took only one break of a little over ten minutes in the morning
session
We broke
at 12:15 for lunch and resumed at 1:15pm. The afternoon session covered the
remainder of Romans 2 through the end of Romans 4. I that section, we completed
the points made by the apostle to show that all were guilty of sin. We then
started towards the end of chapter 3 and throughout chapter 4 to see the
introduction of how we are saved by faith. We discussed at length the concepts
of the words “just,” “justified,” “redemption,” “righteousness,”
“propitiation,” “grace,” “imputed,” “accounted” as well as a careful
examination of Abraham’s life as an example of saving faith. We ended the
afternoon session at 5:20pm after having had only one 15-minute break. It was a
taxing day, but very fruitful. The students left with a homework assignment of
one sermon outline, either textual or exegetical, from the passages covered.
There
was very good attention and participation from the men registered for the
class. Several brethren from the local area as well as some from a long
distance also came to sit in on the classes though they are not registered and
did not get the materials handed out. Please pray for the continued success of
these classes.
