As Paul writes his letter to the Christians living in Rome, he gives us a complete view of his thoughts concerning how one is to live the Christian life. In our scripture reading for this week, (Romans 3:19-28) we find the first step in what is known as the “Roman Road.” This “Roman Road” is four passages of scripture that we can use to answer the question, “Why do I need to be a Christian in the first place?” We find the answer to that question in our scripture reading for today – Romans 3:23.
“For all have sinned and have come short of God’s glory.” (paraphrase mine) Notice closely what that one verse tells us. ALL have sinned – not most, not just a few, not everyone but me; rather ALL have sinned and that sin causes us to “fall short of God’s glory” or heaven and life eternal. The interesting thing about this too is found in the Greek text. The word translated as “sin” is ἁμαρτάνω (hä-mär-tä'-nō). It is an archery term and it literally means not just to miss the bulls-eye, but to miss the entire target! Then we have an interesting thing in the verb tense for sin. It is in a tense that we do not have in English and it means that we sinned yesterday, we will sin to day and guess what, we will sin again tomorrow. Sin is, no matter how hard we try, just a major part of our lives. As hard as we try, we will sin and that sin separates us from God. It separates us that is unless we have Jesus to act as a “go-between” for us, paying for our sins when we have no method of paying for them ourselves. Now, just in case you want to know, the other 3 verses of the Romans Road are 5:8, 6:23 and 10:9-10. Take some time this week to read these four scripture verses. Memorize them so the next time someone asks, “Why do I need Jesus in my life anyway?” you will know how to respond! Amen.
Linda McConwell
11/1/2017 11:29:07 am
Thank you for the message including the verses of the Roman Road. Comments are closed.
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This blog consists of reflections written by the minister each week for the Sunday bulletin. We hope that you enjoy the musings! Archives
January 2020
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