Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth, to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs so that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy, as it is written: "Therefore I will praise you among the Gentiles; I will sing hymns to your name." Again, it says, "Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people." And again, "Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles, and sing praises to him, all you peoples." And again, Isaiah says, "The Root of Jesse will spring up, one who will arise to rule over the nations; the Gentiles will hope in him." May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
(Romans 15:7-13)
We live in an age where hopelessness is on the increase. People have bought into the lie of Satan that we are helpless creature in the hands of fate and unable to do anything about it.
Listen to the perceptive analysis of Woody Allen: "More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness; the other to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly." What a terrible choice! I choose neither road. But Allen reflects the thinking of many today.
Throughout history there have been many who took the view of despair. Usually they rejected God, because if there is a God, then there is always grounds for hope. Writers H.G. Wells and George Bernard Shaw were brilliant men, yet they rejected the message of Scripture. They placed their trust in their own systems of belief, which were based on human reason. Yet they could not find lasting inner peace, and they slowly lost confidence in what they believed. Wells’ final literary work, for example, has been aptly called "a scream of despair." And shortly before Shaw died in 1950, he wrote, "The science to which I pinned my faith is bankrupt. Its counsels, which should have established the millennium, have led directly to the suicide of Europe. I believed them once. In their name I helped to destroy the faith of millions. And now they look at me and witness the great tragedy of an atheist who has lost his faith."
Wells reflects the accuracy of the words of Clare Boothe Luce: "There are no hopeless situations; there are only people who have grown hopeless about them." And when you remove God from the equation there is literally no hope for hopefulness. You see, hopefulness is a matter of perspective.
During the football season, the college bookstore at Iowa State puts a big sign in the window saying "Kill Kansas" or "Whip Washington" or something like that, depending on the name of the upcoming foe. In 1983, just before Iowa State was devastated 72-29 by the nation’s top-ranked team, the wording was altered a bit. The sign read: "Maintain Dignity Against Nebraska." It matters whether you think there is hope.
Hopelessness is a strategy of Satan to keep us down. He wants us to live in defeat, discouragement and despair. If he can isolate us and divide us, then he can defeat us. The church of Jesus Christ must respond to this attack of the enemy by rejecting the unscriptural divisions over pettiness and prejudice that plague us. Our text today gives us a solution to this problem, and a ground of hope for the future.
Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God. (v. 7)
Here we find the principle of acceptance in love. We are called to accept one another in love. That’s what it means when it says that we are to accept one another just as Christ accepted you. Because of His love, He left His heavenly estate and was made a man. Because of His love for us, He went to the Cross and paid the penalty for our sin. Because of His love for us, He received us just as we were. Because of His love we are accepted in Christ.
Acceptance is a wonderful thing. Within each of us are both the desire and the need to be accepted. But there is also the fear that if people really knew us, they wouldn’t accept us. If they knew all the dirty details of my life or if they really knew my failures and frustrations, fears and problems, they would reject me. Some of us have things we would never dare tell anyone because we fear rejection. We have been rejected before, and it hurt. People can be so callous sometimes, so unloving, so cold, so lacking understanding and compassion. Why should we risk it? It’s just too big a risk to take. If only people could accept us, unconditionally. To be accepted without reservation, freely and openly received by others, oh, what a thrill that would be! How we long for perfect and total unconditional acceptance.
That is precisely what Jesus has done for us. He has accepted us. And what makes it even more special is that He knows all about us. Yet, He still accepts us. He loves us and receives us with open arms. what a glorious and wonderful God we serve! When all of our friends forsake us, when even our family turns their back on us, the Lord will take us in. That is how Christ has accepted us, and that is precisely how we are to accept one another. We are to receive one another, not because we are perfect, but because we are loved by God. We are to receive one another with an understanding that we are all on our journey toward Him. I like to say that we are all crawling toward the Light. Some of us are further along than others and we can show the way. Some of us are further back and perhaps we need to do some catching up. But by God’s grace, we are all on the way. We all are struggling to be what we ought to be. And we all need love and acceptance. So let’s lay down our petty differences and receive one another with open arms, seeking God’s best in each other’s lives. After all, that’s what Christ would do, isn’t it?
For I tell you that Christ has become a servant of the Jews on behalf of God’s truth, to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs so that the Gentiles may glorify God for his mercy. (vv. 8-9a)
Again, Christ is our example. He is our prototype. Here we see the example of Christ’s humility as He became a servant to both Jews and Gentiles, to see that God’s purposes were accomplished. Christ was made a Jew and as a Jew He kept the Law. He observed all the ordinances of the Law of Moses, not simply in the letter, but also in the Spirit. By becoming a servant to the Jews, His purpose was to confirm the promises made to the patriarchs. We see in Christ all of the promises brought to fulfillment. He revealed Himself as the Messiah of Israel. In Jesus the promised Messiah had come. God had fulfilled His Word. But He was not only the Messiah of Israel, He was also the Savior of the world. You see, it was not only for Israel that Jesus came. It was for all mankind, both Jews and Gentiles. In verses 9 through 12, we see Scriptures, from the three areas of the Hebrew Scriptures, which indicate that God is a God of the Gentiles as well as a God of the Jews. Paul quotes from the Psalms, which are the Writings: "Rejoice, O Gentiles, with his people.", from Deuteronomy which is the Law: "Praise the Lord, all you Gentiles, and sing praises to him, all you peoples.", and from Isaiah, which is the Prophets: "The Root of Jesse will spring up, one who will arise to rule over the nations; the Gentiles will hope in him.". Christ was the fulfillment of God’s plan for both the Jews and the Gentiles. He came for both, He was a servant to both. Both are accepted by His love.
In following Christ’ example, we are also to be servants to one another. As we accept one another in the love of Christ, we seek to serve and to help one another to be all that God wants us to be. Just as that service for Christ cost Him, so it will cost us our time and resources. Again, Christ shows us the way. He was never too proud to help even "the least of these." From the smallest to the greatest, all of us are infinitely important to God. So should we also be to one another. For our Christianity to be life-changing, it must meet the needs of someone else. For our testimony to be evangelistic, it must be reaching out beyond the usual circle of those whose company we enjoy.
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. (v. 13)
Receiving one another in love paves the way for God to work in our lives in a marvelous way. It opens the door for God to move into our lives, fill us with His joy and peace, and give us hope for the future. Here again, we have one of Paul’s benedictions. He points us again to the source of the power to love one another. Our source is God, the God of hope. Sometimes it’s so easy to give up on one another. But the God of hope can change all that. We are told here that the God of hope will fill us with all joy and peace as you trust in him. The provision is there, but only in God. When we are obedient to Him and follow Christ’s example, God moves in a mighty way to fill us with His joy and peace. And as we are filled with His joy and peace, the Scripture says that we overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. That’s what we need — hope for the future, hope for our lives, hope for the lives of others around us, hope that God is going to accomplish his purposes in us.
Notice that he says that this hope comes by the power of the Holy Spirit. Only as we surrender to the power of the Holy Spirit can we expect His work to be real in our lives.
I heard about an interesting Scientific experiment that was conducted a while back. A group of behavioral Scientists put some Wharf Rats in a tank of water, and observed them to see how long they would survive before drowning. The average time was 17 minutes. Then, they repeated the experiment, but this time they "rescued" the rats just before the point of drowning, dried them off and returned them to their cages, fed them, and let them play for a few days, and repeated the drowning experiment.
This time, the average survival time for these rats increased from 17 minutes to 36 hours! The scientists explained that phenomenon by pointing out that the second time around, the rats had HOPE. They believed that they could survive this, because they had done so before. One scientist said "They were able to survive because the had been SAVED".
It is in our experience with God that we will come to know the hope He can give. It comes from a living encounter with Him through the Holy Spirit of God.
It is the power of the Holy Spirit that the Church desperately needs today. Only as He energizes us as believers can we walk according to the will of God. Only as He fills us and controls us can we enjoy the peace and joy and hope and faith and love and unity of the Spirit. We need a Pentecostal moving of the Spirit once again in the Church of Jesus Christ. We need that rushing, mighty wind to blow through this place. He will deliver us from selfishness. He will cause us to walk in unity and love. Someone said, "When the spiritual tides are low, every shrimp has his own little puddle. But when the mighty ocean of God’s love comes rushing in, we are all caught up in the water spouts of God." Our prayer should be, "Lord, sweep us all up together in love and in unity in You."
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