ST. MARY’S CATHOLIC CHURCH – DUBAI
BIBLE FAITH SHARING
CONDUCTED BY : BR. HILARY Da VEIGA
HELD ON : 18.01.2005
ROMANS 15 (13-33)
ROM 12:1-2 “I appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God – which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of the minds so that you may discern the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Last week we discussed about St. Paul talking to the Gentiles and telling them about how in the O.T. everything was written about them. Now the scriptures are written for you and for me. ‘Heaven and earth will pass away but My word will not pass.’ The Word was in the beginning, right from the beginning there was the Word and God said heaven and earth will pass away but His word will never pass away. Alleluia.
That word lives in you. That word is what you need to speak in the name of Jesus. God spoke that word and heaven and earth was created. In your circumstances, in your situations, in your problems, you need to speak the word and it will come to pass. Whatever you wish to be, you need to believe in your heart and confess in your mouth and it will be done. ROM 10:9-10 “If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved.”
The Bible says that is the word that God spoke and that is the word we have for us tonight. Alleluia.
It was spoken a long time ago. God does not have a time frame. We are bound by time and space but God is infinite, He is omnipresent, He is omniscient, and God spoke to us a long time ago. The Gentiles were brought to faith and they became the flock of God. We were once sinners; we do not know which religion we would have been but someone came and spoke to our fathers and great grand fathers and we came to know Jesus. Alleluia.
Just because someone took that step, just because someone heard the voice of God and stepped out of his comfort zone, we can rejoice and praise God that we are going to heaven. If that man or woman would have not come to speak to our people we probably would have been a Hindu or a Muslim. We do not know if we would ever know Jesus and if we would have been as happy as we are today. Alleluia. Praise the Lord. Amen.
Yes, we are happy because someone did something for us, not only for us but for our whole household. You and your household will be saved. Someone did something for us and for our home. What a blessing! What a chain reaction because some one took that bold step and someone did something. If you talk to someone because of your obedience to God, you do not need to know what has happened to that person, if you are a man of faith. We have to do what God has told us to do. There are no two ways about it. If you believe in a God that speaks you will obey and you will see the fruits of it. Amen.
Some of the Gentiles obeyed the word of God, but some did not. Brothers and sisters, if you do not get charged by the word of God you will get charged by the worldly things. Alleluia. The spirit of God is going to move in such a way that you will not want anything else. We who are not charged with the Spirit of God need everything else to charge us. What is the preacher saying? God has written to the Gentiles through Isaiah and the other prophets and that word which God spoke was everything that Paul was preaching. May be there are many things written in the Bible for us and we do not know and it will be fulfilled when we take that bold step to speak. Are we ready for it?
The victory of Jesus and downfall of Satan cannot come without you and me. Because Jesus came and won the victory, we are more than conquerors in Christ Jesus and we have to claim that victory through Jesus and stamp the devil and more downfalls will come. God said to Jesus – sit by My right side till I make all My enemies a footstool for you. Every time the preacher sees a demon he commands that Satan under the feet of Jesus. Alleluia.
ROMANS 15
ROM 15:13
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
If you do not have hope, if you do not live in hope, what will you live for? That hope is like a candle burning in our lives, that hope to see Jesus, to be in heaven where Jesus lives. Alleluia.
ROM 15:14
I myself feel confident about you, my brothers and sisters, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able to instruct one another.
Do not ever think you do not know the Bible well enough. It is enough to speak that one word that God has given you. Just say ‘Jesus loves you’ and you will see miracles start happening. John 1:11-12 “He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God.” Give people the name of Jesus. Give the people the power to become people of God because there is power in the name of Jesus. If we do not give it, who will give it? Let us wake up!
Here St. Paul is saying you are competent enough so do not leave it only to the priest to do it. They have their obligations but we also could help them in their task.
ROM 15:15
Nevertheless on some points I have written to you rather boldly by way of reminder, because of the grace given to me by God.
St. Paul takes it upon himself to become a minister to carry out the priestly duty. The priestly duty of God 1 Peter 2:9 “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.”
Paul says he is proclaiming the priestly duty. He considered it as his duty. If you do your duty you get paid for it at the end of the month and if you don’t do your duty you get a notice at the end of the month. So you know how to do your earthly duty but we also need to know how to do our heavenly duty.
ROM 15:16
To be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sacrificed by the Holy Spirit.
By St. Paul proclaiming the gospel they become an offering to God, sanctified and anointed by the Holy Spirit because it was the word which cleansed them. The word went inside them and purified them and sent them so that they became acceptable to God. God’s word sanctifies us to make us the spiritual offering to our God.
ROM 15;17-18
In Christ Jesus, then, I have reason to boast of my work for God. For I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to win obedience from the Gentiles, by word and deed.
St. Paul is saying he can glorify God because God through Christ Jesus gave him that service. He is saying he can glorify in nothing but in what God has done through him. He is glorifying that which God has accomplished through him. It is not just words but it is accompanied by deeds. If you stand here and proclaim the word it is not a great thing. There are many preachers that only proclaim the word with such great passion; at the end of it you will see the fruit of it. It is only God who can see deep inside and it is not for us to judge anyone. Here St. Paul was glorifying and proudly saying that he had said and done every sacrifice that he made with love that he poured out to his people.
ROM 15:19
By the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God, so that from Jerusalem and as far around as Illyricum I have fully proclaimed the good news of Christ.
You can imagine St. Paul so boldly saying that he has fully proclaimed the gospel. How many of us can say I have told everyone about our Lord Jesus? How many of us regret that we wish we had spoken about our Lord Jesus. Today we learn from St. Paul that he did not leave a single opportunity to show both in words and in deeds that Jesus was a loving God, the Creator of heaven and earth.
ROM 15:20-21
Thus I will make my ambition to proclaim the good news, not where Christ has already been named, so that I do not build on someone else’s foundation, but as it is written , Those who have never been told of him shall see, and those who have never heard of him shall understand.
Brothers and sisters, so many of us are wasting our time trying to tell one another and forget to sow where no one has sowed. So many are trying to ‘sheep-steal’ and say that saying the Rosary is wrong, etc. and we waste so much time sowing where someone has already sowed. St. Paul was very clear when he said he will not build on someone else’s foundation.
IMPORTANT: How many of our brothers and sisters have left and gone away saying our baptism is wrong, etc. If all this is wrong we do not know whether our forefathers are in purgatory or in hell according to those who left the church. When they did that they put a label on the Catholic Church and that is wrong. There is condemnation and there is accusation and if someone wants to do it, it is their problem. There is no church that is perfect and there will never be a perfect church. The bride will only be perfect when Jesus comes and when He returns to the bride, the church. Every brother who is preaching, all see through dark glasses today but we will know when we see God face to face.
As of now, it is important, it is very important to know that whoever believes in Jesus will never be put to shame. We do not need to bring those people back to the church. The gospel in the Bible does not tell us to bring them back. It is better to preach to someone who does not know Jesus and save them and you will see the fruits of it. Alleluia.
ROM 15:22-24
This is the reason that I have so often been hindered from coming to you. But now, with no further place for me in these regions, I desire, as I have for many years to come to you, when I go to Spain. For I do hope to see you on my journey and to be sent on by you, once I have enjoyed your company for a little while.
The most important thing for Paul is his plans to visit Rome. He says there is no more work for him in those regions because either these people have accepted him or rejected him or they are already waiting to kill him. If he went there, he is only going to die. There is no more room for him to go there. He did all that he could do. He proclaimed in the very best way he could and yet people hated him. It was not the people but the devil living in the people.
ROM 15:25-29
At the present, however, I am going to Jerusalem in a ministry to the saints; for Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to share their resources with the poor among the saints in Jerusalem for Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to share their resources with the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. They were pleased to do this, and indeed they owe it to them; for if the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material things. So, when I have completed this, and have delivered to them what has been collected, I will set out by way of you to Spain; and I know that when I come to you, I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ.
He was going to Jerusalem and this perhaps was his 3rd missionary journey. He was going to Jerusalem and then going to Rome. He was going as a prisoner. The Jewish people never ever liked to take something from others and there was a famine in Jerusalem and the Gentiles felt that they had to help in a material way.
LUKE 6:38”If you give you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full measure, pressed down, shaken together to make room for more and running over. Whatever measure you use in giving – large or small – will be used to measure what is given back to you.”
St. Paul was going to Jerusalem in the service of the saints because of the spiritual blessings that they gave to the Gentiles. Other blessings are nothing compared to the spiritual blessings that they received.
ROM 15:30
I appeal to you, brother and sisters, by our Lord Jesus Christ and by the love of the Spirit, to join me in earnest prayer to God on my behalf.
St. Paul, a very powerful man, is asking the congregation in Rome to pray for him. Our preacher also asks us to pray for the struggle that he is going through. We all go through struggles so we all need to help one another in prayer. Someone may need more prayers, some less but we all need to help one another in prayer as we are one family in Christ.
ROM 15:31-33
That I may be rescued from the unbelievers in Judea, and that my ministry to Jerusalem may be acceptable to the saints so that by God’s will I may come to you with joy and be refreshed in your company, The God of peace be with all of you. Amen.
St. Paul tells them to pray that he may be rescued because he knows what was coming to him from the unbelievers in Judea. He asks for prayers for two things:
(1) pray for being rescued from the unbelievers
(2) pray even within the church, sometimes within the group.
Sometimes the service that we are rendering may not be acceptable. It may be a good service but it may be nothing in the eyes of God. Only prayers can transform the hearts of the people otherwise the good that we do may be unacceptable to Jesus. Only God can send His Spirit and soften the hearts of people. God can do it. Alleluia.
The preacher asked us all to pray for him as he is also going through some struggles.
SCRIPTURE QUOTES TO MEMORIZE:
(1) Heb 11:1 (2) Heb 11:6 (3) Rom 5:8 (4) Rom 12:1-2
(5) Rom 8:14 (6) Rom 10:17 (7) Lk 6:38 (8) 1 Thes 5:16-18
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