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By: Curtis Baker 

Last week as we opened up our study of Romans, we began with an essential question: What is the Gospel?  Paul, who is writing this letter to the Christians at Rome, claims in the opening six verses that his whole mission as an apostle, as well as his own personal appeal in this letter, is based on the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  As we noted last week, the Gospel, simply stated, means “good news.”  The word was widely used in the Roman empire to herald any sort of good news that might be brought to the citizens of Rome, but it was most commonly used to proclaim Caesar’s birthday which was announced as “good news” for the empire who served him.  That understanding of the word has long since been lost from our common understanding, so we often miss the politically subversive message that Paul presents as he proclaims to the capital of the ancient world that the “good news” is not Caesar or his birthday, but instead that Jesus Christ is Lord of heaven and earth.  This is a brave thing to claim in the ancient world, especially in its capital city.  But Paul is not primarily concerned with politics.  He is concerned with truth.  And what he knows to be true is that Jesus Christ is Lord over all, and everything about life rests upon that central fact, political or otherwise.

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