Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Romans 15:5
Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus:
5. Now the God of patience, &c.] Lit. of the patience, &c.; i.e. that now in question. Here is a subtle and beautiful sequence of thought. From patience and comfort, and the hope of glory, St Paul passes at once to the duty of affectionate unanimity. The stronger was the sense of peace and hope in each individual believer, the more would the believing community be lifted above the bitterness and littleness of secondary controversies. Cp. perhaps Col 1:4-5; “ the love which ye have to all the saints, by reason of the hope laid up for you in heaven.”
according to Christ Jesus ] As taught by His precept and example.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Now the God of patience – The God who is himself long-suffering, who bears patiently with the errors and faults of his children, and who can give patience, may he give you of his Spirit, that you may bear patiently the infirmities and errors of each other. The example of God here, who bears long with his children, and is not angry soon at their offences, is a strong argument why Christians should bear with each other. If God bears long and patiently with our infirmities, we ought to bear with each other.
And consolation – Who gives or imparts consolation.
To be like-minded … – Greek To think the same thing; that is, to be united, to keep from divisions and strifes.
According to Christ Jesus – According to the example and spirit of Christ; his was a spirit of peace. Or, according to what his religion requires. The name of Christ is sometimes thus put for his religion; 2Co 11:4; Eph 4:20. If all Christians would imitate the example of Christ, and follow his instructions, there would be no contentions among them. He earnestly sought in his parting prayer their unity and peace; Joh 17:21-23.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Rom 15:5-7
Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded.
The God of patience
When we say God is patient four things are implied.
I. Provocation. Where there is nothing to try the temper there can be no patience. Humanity provokes God. The provocation is great, universal, constant. Measure His patience by the provocation.
II. Sensibility. Where there is no tenderness or susceptibility of feeling, there may be obduracy and stoicism, but no patience. Patience implies feeling. God is infinitely sensitive. Oh, do not this abominable thing, etc.
III. Knowledge. Where the provocation is not known, however great, and however sensitive the being against whom it is directed, there can be no patience. God knows all the provocations.
IV. Power. Where a being has not the power to resent aa insult or to punish a provocation though he may feel it and know it, his forbearing is not patience, it is simply weakness. He is bound by the infirmity of his nature to be passive. God is all powerful. He could damn all His enemies in one breath. (D. Thomas, D.D.)
Patience of God
(text and Nah 1:3):–
I. The nature of this patience, or slowness to anger.
1. It is a modification of the Divine goodness. While goodness respects all creatures, patience has as its object only the sinner.
2. This patience is not the result of ignorance. Every transgression is in full view of Him who is one Eternal Now. And yet the Lord delays His thunders!
3. This perfection does not result from impotence (chap. 9:22; Num 14:17).
4. Neither does it result from a connivance at sin, or a resolution to suffer it with impunity.
5. It is grounded on the everlasting covenant, and the blood of Jesus. Why was not patience exercised to the fallen angels? Because Jesus had not engaged to atone for them, as He had engaged to become the surety of man.
II. Some of the most illustrious manifestations of it.
1. When our first parents sinned, patience held them in being, gave them an opportunity of securing a better Eden, and pointed them to that Messiah who should repair the ruins of the fall.
2. When the old world had corrupted its way before God, for 120 years He bore with its enormities, sent His Spirit to strive with them, and His messengers to warn them.
3. When the Canaanites indulged in every abomination, He delayed for four hundred years to inflict on them the punishments they deserved.
4. When the Gentile nations, instead of adoring the God of heaven, had placed the vilest passions and the grossest vices in the seat of the Divinity, the Lord left not Himself without witness (Act 14:17).
5. When the Israelites, notwithstanding His numberless miracles and amazing mercies, rebelled against Him, did He not bear with them? But why do I mention particular examples? There is not a spot on our globe, there is not an instant that has elapsed, there is not a human being that has existed, that does not prove the forbearance of our God. Consider the number, the greatness, and the continuance of the provocations against Him by His creatures whom He hath surrounded with blessings, for whose redemption He gave His Son.
6. Consider the conduct of God towards those whom He is compelled ultimately to punish. Before the judgment He solemnly and affectionately warns them. If they are still obstinate, He delays, gives new mercies, that their souls at last may be touched. If He must punish, He does it by degrees (Psa 78:38). If at last He must pour out His vengeance upon the incorrigible sinner, He does it with reluctance. Why wilt thou die? How shall I give thee up, Ephraim?
III. The reasons why he exercises such long-suffering. Lovely as is this attribute, its exercise has often appeared mysterious to the pious, and has been abused by the sinner. Yet a little reflection would have convinced them that in this, as in all the other proceedings of His providence, the manifold wisdom of God is shown. He is patient–
1. From His nature (Lam 3:33).
2. That this perfection may be glorified. There can be no exercise of it in heaven, since there will be nothing to require it; none in hell, since there will be nothing but wrath (Isa 48:9).
3. In consequence of the prayers of pious ancestors, and of the promises made to them and their offspring after them. Ah! careless children of pious parents, you know not how much you are indebted to them.
4. From the mixture of the wicked with the pious, and the near relations subsisting between them. From love to His dear children, He spares His enemies (2Ki 22:18; 2Ki 22:20).
5. Because the number of His elect is not yet completed, and because many of the descendants of these wicked men shall be trophies of His grace. Had a wicked Ahaz been cut off at once, a pious Hezekiah would never have lived and pleaded the cause of God.
6. Because the measure of their sins is not yet filled up (Zec 5:6, etc.).
7. That sinners may be brought to repentance (2Pe 3:15).
8. That sinners who continue impenitent may at last be without excuse.
9. That Gods power may be displayed; the greatness of His protection and providence be manifested in preserving the Church in the midst of her enemies.
10. That He may exercise the trust of His servants in Him, and the patience of His saints; that He may call forth the graces of the righteous, and try their sincerity.
IV. Inferences. Is God infinitely patient?
1. With what love to Him should the consideration of this attribute inspire us?
2. What a motive to the deepest repentance (Rom 2:4).
3. Let us imitate Him in this perfection of His nature.
4. What a source of comfort is this to believers.
5. Then how patient should we be in all the afflictions with which He visits us?
6. Who, then, will not grieve at the reproaches and insults that are cast upon him? (H. Kollock, D.D.)
The grace of patience
It takes a brave soul to bear all this so grandly, said a tender-hearted doctor, stooping over his suffering patient. She lifted her heavy eyelids, and looking into the doctors face, replied, It is not the brave soul at all; God does it all for me.
Pauls prayer
I. The title he gives to God. The God of patience and consolation, i.e., a God that–
1. Bears with us.
2. Gives us patience and comfort.
II. The mercy he begs of God.
1. The foundation of Christian love and peace is laid in likemindedness.
2. This likemindedness must be according to Christ.
3. It is the gift of God.
III. The end of his desire. That God may be glorified–
1. By Christian unity.
2. As the Father of Christ. (M. Henry.)
Unity
I. Its nature. Likeminded.
II. Its motives.
1. The character of God.
2. The mind and will of Christ.
III. Its source. God. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
Christian unity
1. Flows from the God of patience and consolation.
2. Is conformable to the mind and will of Christ.
3. Finds expression in the united praises of God, even the Father of Christ. (J. Lyth, D. D.)
According to Christ Jesus.—
Jesus view of life
How did the Christ look upon the lives of men? We may be sure that He saw all the strange minglings of comedies and tragedies which so confuse and exhaust us. If we feel at times the myriad multiplicity and infinite confusions of life, and wonder what it all means and is worth, we may be perfectly sure that the most sensitive and receptive soul that ever was found in fashion as a man felt life as we never have. He measured in His own experience our temptations, and His life took in Cana of Galilee, a sick room in Capernaum, the market-place before the temple, the streets of the city, the country towns by the sea, the Master in Israel, the multitude of the people, the whole world of His day and of all days–our world-age and Gods eternity. Remembering thus that Jesus lived as never poet, philosopher, or novelist has lived, in the real world of human motives and hearts, with our real human life a daily transparency before His eye, open now these Gospels and see if you can find there in Jesus view of our life, in His thought of us, any such sense of the emptiness, vanity, strangeness of life, as we have often felt resting like a shadow over our thoughts. Did not He look upon things as contradictory to goodness and God as anything we have ever seen under the sun? And with purer eyes? Did not He feel with larger sympathy and warmer heart the broken, tangled, bleeding lives of men? Did not He bear the sin of the world? Where, then, is our human word of doubt among His words? Where is the echo of mans despair among the sayings of our Lord? He could weep with those who mourned; but He spake and thought of life and the resurrection before the grave of Lazarus. You cannot say that He did not understand our sense of lifes mystery and brokenness. He saw it all in Marys tears. He read it in the thoughts of disciples hearts. Why, then, did He never reproduce our common human weariness and doubt in His thought of life? It is not an endless wonder to Him. He sees our life surrounded by the living God. He sees, beneath our world, undergirding it, Gods mighty purpose. He sees above the righteous Father. He sees the calm of eternity. And knowing life better than you or I do, knowing such things as you may have heard yesterday or may experience tomorrow–enough sometimes to make men wonder whether there be a God, or truth, or anything of worth–Jesus Christ, in full, open view of all life, said, Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. Ye believe in God; believe also in Me. We begin to come now in sight of the conclusion to which I wish to lead. The evangelists could not possibly have omitted this common human characteristic if the character of Jesus had been the creation of their own imaginations. You will find shadow after shadow of our human questioning crossing the path of Buddha, and lingering upon the heights of human genius, but not the shadow of a passing doubt or fear over all Jesus conversation with men. How could the Son of man look thus in the joy and triumph of a God upon such a strange thing as our life is? It was because He saw the coming order and the all-sufficient grace for life. It was because He knew that He was Lord of the creation from before the foundation of the world, and the world sooner or later is to be according to Christi According to Christi This is the keyword for the interpretation of the creation. Everything comes right, as it takes form and being according to Christ. Everything in life or death shall be well, as it ends in accordance with Christ. This is the keynote for the final harmony–According to Christ! We shall understand life at last, we shall find all its shadows turned to light by and by, if we take up our lives and seek to live them day by day according to Christ. Every man who can read the New Testament can begin, if he chooses, to order his life according to Christ. He may not understand the doctrines. But when he goes down to his office or store, and looks his brother-man in the face, he may know what things are honest and of good report according to Jesus Christ. When he goes to his home he may know what manner of life there is according to Christ. Yes, and when trouble comes, or sickness, or we near the end, then we may know how we need not fear, nor be troubled, according to Christ. In our churches, too, we may be of many minds on many subjects, but we ought to know also how to be of the same mind, if we are willing to think and to judge all things by this one infallible rule–According to Christ. (Newman Smyth, D.D.)
That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God.
The elements of unity
1. One God and Father.
2. One Lord and Saviour.
3. One heart and mind.
4. One mouth and language.
5. One object and aim. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
Christian unanimity
With our mind we must think the same things, ere with our mouth we can speak the same things. Were we then more slow to speak of the things on which we differ, and more ready to speak of the things on which we agree, it would mightily conduce to the peace and unity of the visible Church. The members of the Church at Rome differed in regard both to meats and days; and Paul as good as enjoined silence about these, when he bade, them receive each other, but not to doubtful disputations. But, on the other hand, he bids them join with one mouth, as well as one mind, in giving glory to God. (T. Chalmers, D. D.)
Christians and the glory of God
In explanation of the command to glorify God–it may seem strange and presumptuous to speak of such poor, sinful, worthless beings as we are, as glorifying, or as capable of glorifying God. But the perfect Christian may be compared to a perfect mirror, which, though dark and opaque of itself, being placed before the sun reflects his whole image, and may be said to increase his glory by increasing and scattering his light. In this view, we may regard heaven, where God is perfectly glorified in His saints, as the firmament, studded with ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands of mirrors, every one of them reflecting a perfect image o,f God, the sun in the centre, and filling the universe with the blaze of His glory. (H. G. Salter.)
The glory of God the end of mans creation
I have a clock on my parlour mantelpiece. A very pretty little clock it is, with a gilt frame, and a glass case to cover it. Almost every one who sees it, says, What a pretty clock! But it has one great defect–it will not run; and therefore, as a clock, it is perfectly useless. Though it is very pretty, it is a bad clock, because it never tells what time it is. Now, my bad clock is like a great many persons in the world. Just as my clock does not answer the purpose for which it was made–that is, to keep time–so, many persons do not answer the purpose for which they were made. What did God make us for? Why, you will say, He made us that we might love Him and serve Him. Well, then, if we do not love God and serve Him, we d o not answer the purpose for which He made us: we may be, like the clock, very p retry, and be very kind, and very obliging; but if we do not answer the purpose for which God made us, we are just like the clock–bad. Those of my readers who live in the country, and have seen an apple-tree in full blossom, know what a beautiful sight it is. But suppose it only bore blossoms, and did not produce fruit, you would say it is a bad apple-tree. And so it is. Everything is bad, and every person is bad, and every boy and girl is bad, if they do not answer the purpose for which God made them. God did not make us only to play and amuse ourselves, but also that we might do His will.
Glorifying God
The time when Venn passed from the state of nature into the state of grace seems to have been, not when he threw away his cricket bat, but when, in the exercise of his ministerial function, he was arrested by an expression in the Form of Prayer, which he had been accustomed to employ, without, however, apprehending its true import. That I may live to the glory of Thy name, was the expression. As he read it, the thought forcibly struck him, What is it to live to the glory of Gods name? Do I live as I pray? What course of life ought I to pursue to glorify God? The prosecution of the inquiries thus suggested led to a juster conception of the chief end of man, which, with characteristic conscientious energy, he straightway followed out by a corresponding change in his mode of life. We can imagine with what depth of sympathy and interest this circumstance would be listened to by Lady Glenorchy, who, at a later period of his life, was Venns intimate friend, and whose religious life, like his, was dated from her serious attention to the noble answer given to the question which stands first in the Assemblys Shorter Catechism, Mans chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy Him for ever.
Wherefore receive ye one another as Christ also received us.–
Mutual conciliation enforced by the example of Christ
I. How Christ received us.
1. When we were weak and guilty.
2. Freely and heartily.
3. To fellowship in glory.
II. How we should receive one another.
1. Kindly, overlooking all infirmities and differences of opinion.
2. Sincerely, with the heart.
3. Into brotherly fellowship, as heirs together of the grace of God. (J. Lyth, D.D.)
Christian fellowship
I. The reasonableness of this practice, whereby it will appear to be the duty of those who profess the religion of Christ to agree together, and form themselves into particular societies.
1. Without such an agreement to unite together in the practice of Christianity, there can be no such thing as public worship regularly maintained among Christians, nor public honours paid to God in the name of Jesus.
2. Without an agreement to keep up such societies for worship, the doctrines of Christ and His gospel could not be so constantly and extensively held forth to the world, and there would be no rational hope of the continuance or increase of Christianity among men.
II. The advantages of such an agreement for Christian fellowship.
1. It gives courage to every Christian to profess and practise his religion when many persons are engaged by mutual agreement in the same profession and practice.
2. It is more for the particular edification of Christians that such societies should be formed, where the Word of Christ is constantly preached, where the ordinances of Christ are administered, and the religion of Christ is held forth in a social and honourable manner to the world.
3. Such a holy fellowship and agreement to walk together in the ways of Christ is a happy guard against backsliding and apostacy, it is a defence against the temptations of the world and the defilements of a sinful age.
4. Christians thus united together by mutual acquaintance and agreement can give each other better assistance in everything that relates to religion, whether public or private.
III. The persons who should thus receive one another in the Lord, or join together in Christian fellowship. All that Christ has receipted to partake of His salvation (Rom 14:1-3; Rom 14:17-18). This is the general rule: but it must be; confessed that there are some Christians whose sentiments are so directly contrary to others in matters of discipline or doctrine, that it is hardly possible they should unite in public worship. But let every person take heed that he does not too much enlarge, nor too much narrow the principles of Christianity, that he does not make any article of faith or practice more or less necessary than Scripture has made it, and that he does not raise needless scruples in his own breast, nor in the hearts of others, by too great a separation from such as our common Lord has received.
IV. The duties which plainly arise from such an agreement of Christians to walk and worship together for the support of their religion.
1. All the duties which the disciples of Christ owe to their fellow Christians throughout; the world are more particularly incumbent upon those who are united by their own consent in the same religious society (Gal 6:10).
2. Those who are united by such an agreement ought to attend on the public assemblies and ministrations of that Church, where it can be done with reasonable convenience; for we have joined ourselves in society for this very purpose.
3. It is the duty cf persons thus united to maintain their Church or society by receiving in new members amongst them by a general consent.
4. In order to keep the Church pure from sin and scandal, they should separate themselves from those that walk disorderly, who are guilty of gross and known sins (2Th 2:6; 1Co 5:4-5; 1Co 5:7; 1Co 5:11; 1Co 5:13).
5. It is necessary that officers be chosen by the Church to fulfil several offices in it and for it.
6. It is the duty of those whose circumstances will afford it, to contribute of their earthly substance toward the common expenses of the society. And each one should give according to his ability: this is but a piece of common justice.
7. Everything of Church affairs ought to be managed with decency and order, with harmony and peace (1Co 14:40; 1Co 16:14).
V. Reflections.
1. How beautiful is the order of the gospel and the fellowship of a Christian Church. How strong and plain are the foundations and the ground of it. It is built on eternal reason and the relations of things, as well as on the Word of God.
2. How little do they value the true interests of Christian religion, the public honour of Christ and His gospel, or the edification and comfort of their own souls, who neglect this holy communion.
3. How criminal are those persons who break the beautiful order and harmony of a Church of Christ for trifles.
4. When we behold a society of Christians flourishing in holiness, and honourably maintaining the beauty of this sacred fellowship, let us raise our thoughts to the heavenly world, to the Church of the first-born, who are assembled on high, where everlasting beauty, order, peace, and holiness are maintained in the presence of Jesus our common Lord. And when we meet with little inconveniences, uneasiness, and contest, in any Church of Christ on earth, let us point our thoughts and our hopes still upward to that Divine fellowship of the saints and the spirits of the just made perfect, where contention and disorder have no place. (I. Watts, D.D.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 5. Now the God of patience and consolation] May that God who endued them with patience, and gave them the consolation that supported them in all their trials and afflictions, grant you to be like-minded – give you the same mode of thinking, and the same power of acting towards each other, according to the example of Christ.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Now the God of patience and consolation: he is called, the God of all grace, 1Pe 5:10, the God of hope, Rom 15:13, the God of peace, Rom 15:33, the God of love and peace, 2Co 13:11, and here, the God of patience and consolation: the meaning is, he is the author and worker thereof. You read in the former verse of the patience and comfort of the Scriptures; and here he showeth that the Scriptures do not work these of themselves, but God doth it in and by them.
Grant you to be like-minded one towards another; this is that to which he had exhorted them, Rom 12:16. See the like, 1Co 1:10; 2Co 13:11; Eph 4:3; Phi 2:2. God is the author, as of patience and consolation, so of peace and concord: the grace of unity and charity is his gift; he maketh men of one mind and of one heart, and for this he should be inquired of by his saints and people to do it for them.
According to Christ Jesus; i.e. according to his doctrine, command, or example.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
5, 6. Now the God of patience andconsolationSuch beautiful names of God are taken from thegraces which He inspires: as “the God of hope” (Ro15:13), “the God of peace” (Ro15:33).
grant you to belikeminded“of the same mind”
according to Christ JesusItis not mere unanimity which the apostle seeks for them; for unanimityin evil is to be deprecated. But it is “according to ChristJesus“after the sublimest model of Him whoseall-absorbing desire was to do, “not His own will, but the willof Him that sent Him” (Joh6:38).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Now the God of patience and consolation,…. These titles and characters of God are manifestly used on account of what is before said concerning the Scriptures, and to show, that the efficacy and usefulness of them, in producing and promoting patience and comfort, entirely depend upon God the author of them: from exhorting, the apostle proceeds to petitioning; well knowing that all his exhortations would be of no avail without the power of divine grace accompanying them. The words are a prayer. The object addressed is described as “the God of patience”, because he is the author and giver of that grace: it is a fruit of his Spirit, produced by the means of his word, called the word of his patience. The Heathens themselves were so sensible that this is a divine blessing, that they call patience , “the invention of the gods” w. God is the great pattern and exemplar of patience; he is patient himself, and bears much and long with the children of men; with wicked men, whose patient forbearance and longsuffering being despised by them, will be an aggravation of their damnation; but his longsuffering towards his elect issues in their salvation: he waits to be gracious to them before conversion, and after it bears with their infirmities, heals their backslidings, forgives their iniquities, patiently hears their cues, requests, and complaints, relieves and supports them, and carries them even to hoary hairs; and is in all a pattern to be imitated by his people. He is also the object of this grace; he it is on whom and for whom saints should and do patiently wait, until he is pleased to manifest himself, and communicate to them for the supply of their wants of every sort; and upon whose account and for whose sake they patiently suffer reproach and persecution; the exercise of patience is what he requires, and calls for, and is very grateful and well pleasing to him; to all which add, that he it is who strengthens to the exercise of it, and increases it; and which he does sometimes by tribulation; faith and other graces, being thereby tried, produce patience; and which at length, through divine grace, has its perfect work. Moreover, the object of prayer is described, as “the God of consolation”; all true, real, solid comfort springs from him, which he communicates by his son, the consolation of Israel; by his Spirit, the comforter; by his word, the doctrines and promises of which afford strong consolation to the heirs of promise, sensible sinners and afflicted souls; by the ordinances of the Gospel, which are breasts of consolation; and by the faithful ministers of Christ, who are “Barnabases”, sons of consolation, Ac 4:36. The petition follows,
grant you to be like minded one towards another; which does not respect sameness of judgment in the doctrines of faith; though this is very necessary to an honourable and comfortable walking together in church fellowship; much less an agreement in things indifferent: the apostle’s meaning is not, that they should all abstain from meats forbidden by the law of Moses, or that they should all eat every sort of food without distinction; nor that they should all observe any Jewish day, or that they should all observe none; rather, that everyone should enjoy his own sentiment, and practise as he believed: but this request regards a likeness of affection, the sameness of mutual love, that they be of one heart, and one soul; that notwithstanding their different sentiments about things of a ceremonious kind, yet that they should love one another, and cease either to despise or judge each other; but think as well and as highly of them that differ from them, as of themselves, and of those of their own sentiments, without preferring in affection one to another; but studying and devising to promote and maintain, as the Syriac here reads it, , “an equality” among them; showing the same equal affection and respect to one as to the other, and to one another; the Jew to the Gentile, and the Gentile to the Jew; the strong to the weak, and the weak to the strong. This is what is greatly desirable. It is grateful to God; it is earnestly wished for by the ministers of the Gospel: and is pleasant and delightful to all good men; but it is God alone that can give and continue such a Spirit: this the apostle knew, and therefore prays that he would “grant” it: and for which request there is a foundation for faith and hope concerning it; since God has promised he will give his people one heart, and one way, as to fear him, so to love one another. The rule or pattern, according to which this is desired, is next expressed,
according to Christ Jesus; according to the doctrine of Christ, which teaches, directs, and engages, as to sameness of judgment and practice, so to mutual love and affection; and according to the new commandment of Christ, which obliges to love one another; and according to the example of Christ, who is the great pattern of patience and forbearance, of meekness and humility, of condescension and goodness, and of equal love and affection to all his members.
w Archilochus apud Philostrat. Vit. Apollon. l. 7. c. 12.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
| Christian Unity. | A. D. 58. |
5 Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: 6 That ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The apostle, having delivered two exhortations, before he proceeds to more, intermixes here a prayer for the success of what he had said. Faithful ministers water their preaching with their prayers, because, whoever sows the seed, it is God that gives the increase. We can but speak to the ear; it is God’s prerogative to speak to the heart. Observe,
I. The title he gives to God: The God of patience and consolation, who is both the author and the foundation of all the patience and consolation of the saints, from whom it springs and on whom it is built. He gives the grace of patience; he confirms and keeps it up as the God of consolation; for the comforts of the Holy Ghost help to support believers, and to bear them up with courage and cheerfulness under all their afflictions. When he comes to beg the pouring out of the spirit of love and unity he addresses himself to God as the God of patience and consolation; that is, 1. As a God that bears with us and comforts us, is not extreme to mark what we do amiss, but is ready to comfort those that are cast down–to teach us so to testify our love to our brethren, and by these means to preserve and maintain unity, by being patient one with another and comfortable one to another. Or, 2. As a God that gives us patience and comfort. He had spoken (v. 4) of patience and comfort of the scriptures; but here he looks up to God as the God of patience and consolation: it comes through the scripture as the conduit-pipe, but from God as the fountain-head. The more patience and comfort we receive from God, the better disposed we are to love one another. Nothing breaks the peace more than an impatient, and peevish, and fretful melancholy temper.
II. The mercy he begs of God: Grant you to be like-minded one towards another, according to Christ Jesus. 1. The foundation of Christian love and peace is laid in like-mindedness, a consent in judgment as far as you have attained, or at least a concord and agreement in affection. To auto phronein—to mind the same thing, all occasions of difference removed, and all quarrels laid aside. 2. This like-mindedness must be according to Christ Jesus, according to the precept of Christ, the royal law of love, according to the pattern and example of Christ, which he had propounded to them for their imitation, v. 3. Or, “Let Christ Jesus be the centre of your unity. Agree in the truth, not in any error.” It was a cursed concord and harmony of those who were of one mind to give their power and strength to the beast (Rev. xvii. 13); this was not a like-mindedness according to Christ, but against Christ; like the Babel-builders, who were one in their rebellion, Gen. xi. 6. The method of our prayer must be first for truth, and then for peace; for such is the method of the wisdom that is from above: it is first pure, then peaceable. This is to be like-minded according to Christ Jesus. 3. Like-mindedness among Christians, according to Christ Jesus, is the gift of God; and a precious gift it is, for which we must earnestly seek unto him. He is the Father of spirits, and fashions the hearts of men alike (Ps. xxxiii. 15), opens the understanding, softens the heart, sweetens the affections, and gives the grace of love, and the Spirit as a Spirit of love, to those that ask him. We are taught to pray that the will of God may be done on earth as it is done in heaven–now there it is done unanimously, among the angels, who are one in their praises and services; and our desire must be that the saints on earth may be so too.
III. The end of his desire: that God may be glorified, v. 6. This is his plea with God in prayer, and is likewise an argument with them to seek it. We should have the glory of God in our eye in every prayer; therefore our first petition, as the foundation of all the rest, must be, Hallowed be thy name. Like-mindedness among Christians is in order to our glorifying God, 1. With one mind and one mouth. It is desirable that Christians should agree in every thing, that so they may agree in this, to praise God together. It tends very much to the glory of God, who is one, and his name one, when it is so. It will not suffice that there be one mouth, but there must be one mind, for God looks at the heart; nay, there will hardly be one mouth where there is not one mind, and God will scarcely be glorified where there is not a sweet conjunction of both. One mouth in confessing the truths of God, in praising the name of God–one mouth in common converse, not jarring, biting, and devouring one another–one mouth in the solemn assembly, one speaking, but all joining. 2. As the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is his New-Testament style. God must be glorified as he has now revealed himself in the face of Jesus Christ, according to the rules of the gospel, and with an eye to Christ, in whom he is our Father. The unity of Christians glorifies God as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, because it is a kind of counter-part or representation of the oneness that is between the Father and the Son. We are warranted so to speak of it, and, with that in our eye, to desire it, and pray for it, from John xvii. 21, That they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee: a high expression of the honour and sweetness of the saints’ unity. And it follows, The the world may believe that thou hast sent me; and so God may be glorified as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
The God of patience and comfort ( ). Genitive case of the two words in verse 4 used to describe God who uses the Scriptures to reveal himself to us. See 2Co 1:3 for this idea; Ro 15:13 for “the God of hope”; 15:33 for “the God of peace.”
Grant you ( ). Second aorist active optative (Koine form for older ) as in 2Thess 3:16; Eph 1:17; 2Tim 1:16; 2Tim 1:18; 2Tim 2:25, though MSS. vary in Eph 1:17; 2Tim 2:25 for (subjunctive). The optative here is for a wish for the future (regular idiom).
According to Christ Jesus ( ). “According to the character or example of Christ Jesus” (2Cor 11:17; Col 2:8; Eph 5:24).
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1) “Now the God of patience,” (ho de theos tes hupomones) “Moreover the God of patience,” from whom patience originates, “the fountainhead of patience”; This is a prayer of Paul that the Roman brethren might glorify God in helping others.
2) “And consolation,” (kai tes parakleseos) “And the God of comfort,” the source, origin, or “fountainhead of comfort,” that was introduced in the previous verse; Php_2:1-3; Heb 10:36-37.
3) “Grant to you to be like-minded,” (doe humin to auto phronein) “Grant to you to mind or to attend continually, unceasingly, to the same thing,” the like disposition, the identical attitude in moral judgment and temper that Jesus had, to cherish harmony and unity, 1Co 1:10; Rom 12:16.
4) “One toward another according to Christ Jesus,” (en allelois kata Christon desoun) “Among one another, according to the pattern of Christ”; according to his will and example; 1Co 11:11; 1Co 3:16-17; Eph 4:32.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
5. And the God of patience, etc. God is so called from what he produces; the same thing has been before very fitly ascribed to the Scriptures, but in a different sense: God alone is doubtless the author of patience and of consolation; for he conveys both to our hearts by his Spirit: yet he employs his word as the instrument; for he first teaches us what is true consolation, and what is true patience; and then he instills and plants this doctrine in our hearts.
But after having admonished and exhorted the Romans as to what they were to do, he turns to pray for them: for he fully understood, that to speak of duty was to no purpose, except God inwardly effected by his Spirit what he spoke by the mouth of man. The sum of his prayer is, — that he would bring their minds to real unanimity, and make them united among themselves: he also shows at the same time what is the bond of unity, for he wished them to agree together according to Christ Jesus Miserable indeed is the union which is unconnected with God, and that is unconnected with him, which alienates us from his truth. (443)
And that he might recommend to us an agreement in Christ, he teaches us how necessary it is: for God is not truly glorified by us, unless the hearts of all agree in giving him praise, and their tongues also join in harmony. There is then no reason for any to boast that he will give glory to God after his own manner; for the unity of his servants is so much esteemed by God, that he will not have his glory sounded forth amidst discords and contentions. This one thought ought to be sufficient to check the wanton rage for contention and quarreling, which at this day too much possesses the minds of many.
(443) There is a difference of opinion as to the unity contemplated here, whether it be that of sentiment or of feeling. The phrase, τὸ αὐτὸ φρονεῖν, occurs in the following places, Rom 12:16; Phi 2:2 [ Leigh ] says, that the phrase signifies to be of one mind, of one judgment, of one affection, towards one another. But though the verb φρονεῖν may admit of these three significations, yet the Apostle no doubt had in view a specific idea; and when we consider that he had been inculcating the principle of toleration as to unity of sentiment with regard to the eating of meats and of observing of days, and that he has been enforcing the duty of forbearance, and of sympathy, and of love towards each other, it appears probable that unity of feeling and of concern for each other’s welfare is what is intended here. [ Beza ], [ Scott ], and [ Chalmers ] take this view, while [ Pareus ], [ Mede ], and [ Stuart ] take the other, that is, that unity of sentiment is what is meant.
What confirms the former, in addition to the general import of the context, is the clause which follows, “according to Christ Jesus,” which evidently means, “according to his example,” as mentioned in verse 3.
Then in the next verse, the word ὁμοθυμαδὸν refers to the unity of feeling and of action, rather than to that of sentiment. It occurs, besides here, in these places, Act 1:14; Act 4:24; Act 7:57; Act 12:20; Act 18:12. It is used by the Septuagint for יחד, which means “together.” It is rendered “ unanimiter — unanimously,” [ Beza ]; “with one mind,” by [ Doddridge ]; and “unanimously,” by [ Macknight ]. It is thus paraphrased by [ Grotius ], “with a mind full of mutual love, free from contempt, free from hatred.” — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES
Rom. 15:5.Christ is both the example and motive of the Christian mind. God who bestows patience; just as the God of grace is the God who imparts grace.
Rom. 15:6.God of the man Christ Jesus; Father of the divine Word.
Rom. 15:7.The glory of God was the end of all Christ did on earth or does in heaven.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Rom. 15:5-7
A prayer that looks for results.Oftentimes we pray, and do not expect answers. Our prayers are in a great measure purposeless. Modern scepticism creeps into the heart of the modern Christian. What profit shall we have if we pray unto Him? expresses too much the latent feeling of many natures. Let us seek to have more faith in the efficacy of prayer; let us rise up to the position of ancient saints; let us realise our privilege, and believe that God answers prayer.
I. The prayer.Notice about this prayer that it is:
1. Brief. Most of the prayers of the New Testament are short, and yet powerful. The model prayer is short. This, however, does not preclude long and earnest wrestling in secret. The Master was much in prayer. As the Master, so the servant should be.
2. Comprehensive. Short prayers are sometimes the most comprehensive. How much is comprehended in the Church of England collects! Here in one verse is a collect of large comprehension. A great soul, feeling the burden of its desire, puts much thought in few words. Little thought, many words. Let our words be few, but let our thoughts be many and earnest, as we come to the God of thought.
3. Well planned. God is addressed as the fountain of those qualities which are needful for the desired result. Patience and consolation are needful for Christian harmony. Provocations will arise. The strong will require patience with the infirmities of the weak; while the weak will require patience with the tendency to overbearance in the strong. Mutual forbearance demands patience and consolation from the divine source. Unity of affection will be disturbed if there be not patience. Oneness of sentiment, likemindedness, sameness of heart, must be generated from God through the gracious channel and according to the glorious example of Jesus Christ.
II. The expected result.In the modern Church we find too often many minds and many mouths, and some of the mouths very large, very noisy, and very difficult to close. One mind and one mouththe one mind of love, the one mouth of praise to God. What a blessed unity! What divine harmony! Many minds blended by the one mind of love; many mouths so united as if only one mouth were expressing the various sounds. One mind absorbed in the mind of eternal love. What a picture! The many minds and many mouths of the Church militant concentred in one mind and one mouth that glorifies God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The children of earth spring from one Father, and should have one mind of love. The primitive Church is a pattern for the modern Church. It is true that there were discords, but there was such harmony that it was said, See how these Christians love one another. St. Pauls prayer and St. Pauls example not without blessed results. Let us each pray and act so that one mind and one mouth may be the characteristic of the modern Church.
III. The natural exhortation.Wherefore receive ye one another. The exhortation is founded on the prayer and on the expected results. Receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God. How graciously wide the receptions of Christ! Our at homes are formal receptions occurring at wide intervals; Christ was always at home to the homeless, the sad, and the weary. The King of heaven held court with publicans and sinners. His drawing-room is the wide world, where weary hearts are seeking rest. To be presented at His court, we need neither rank, nor title, nor costly apparel. He welcomes broken hearts and contrite souls; the weak He loves to tend; the bruised reed He does not break. How difficult and how far-reaching the exhortation, Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ, etc.! Let our receptions be loving and hearty. The grace of love is nobler than the pompous dignity of officialism. Let us receive one another. Let Christians exemplify the true solidarity. Let them be brothers, not in name merely, but in deed and in truth.
Rom. 15:6. Worship of the unknowable yet lovable God.That which is perfect cannot be made more glorious. We cannot by our adoration or admiration increase the glory of the sun, the brilliancy of the stars, the majesty of the mountains, the beauty of the landscape, the loveliness of the perfect flower, the melody of the sweet-singing bird. God is perfect, and we cannot by our worship increase His glory. He was glorious before the heavens by their splendours proclaimed His glory, and He will be glorious when they have shrivelled up as a parchment scroll. He was glorious before Adam sang His praises amid the beauties of the primeval Eden, and He will be glorious when this planet in its present form has heard the last chant of praise. But as the heavens declare His glory, as the charming landscape sets forth His divine goodness, so man may glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. What a pity that man is so often the least vocal amid the many praising voices of Gods world! Let it be ours with one mind and one mouth to glorify God.
I. Whom must we worship?It is like a truism to say that we must not worship ourselves; and yet is there not a vast deal of self-worship in our public exercises of religion? Is not the God we worship the projected ideal of our own creation? Idolatry is supposed to be extinct in these countries, and to have been extinct for a long period. But there are idols of the mind; and if we were gifted with the power of seeing the unseen, we should be astonished at the number of idols being worshipped in the temples set apart to the worship of the one God. Are our pantheons all destroyed? Do we worship ourselves when we ought to worship Godourselves, by proclaiming our goodness to the worldourselves, by setting forth our own peculiar creedourselves, by listening to our favourite preacher? Let us seek more and more to worship the eternal Spirit in spirit and in truth. We must worship:
1. The unknowable God. We have been told in a recent book that God is not wisely trusted when declared unintelligible. The God who cannot be wisely trusted cannot be properly worshipped. But what reason is there to shrink from the idea of a God who is unintelligible? Surely Zophars question is pertinent to such objections: Canst thou by searching find out God? Canst thou find out the Almighty to perfection? If God were fully intelligible, He could not command the admiration of a noble soul and the worship of an aspiring heart. The unknown is all around us. We move amid the unknowables. We ourselves are amongst the number. Take the simple question, What is life? and who is there to answer? What is that subtle force which the anatomists skill cannot detect? Does life reside in the pineal gland as on a throne and give orders over the kingdom of man? Is it an all-pervading force? Is it a delicate ether extracted from exquisitely compounded and distilled material substances? Life is, with our present faculties, unknowable. Is it any wonder that the Giver of life is unknowable? God is infinite, and is thus unknowable. We do not know what infinite duration means. The infinite is simply a mysterious something stretching beyond the finite. The moment we think of the infinite we make it finite by our thought. The infinite is unintelligible; but we believe in a duration which can only be described by an unintelligible term. The infinite power, wisdom, and love of God are unintelligible; still we believe in a wisdom that planned and a power which worked out creative designs, and a love which, working by power and wisdom, achieved our redemption. We worship a power, wisdom, and even love which we cannot fully understand. Worship is the adoration of the loving spiritit is the upward rising of the soul; and how can the soul rise towards that Being who is on the same level? Worship is elicited, not by the little, but by the great. The old church-builders had surely this in view when they reared their grandly vast and solemn temples. We must in our true worship rise to the unknown and see the unseen. The eternal Spirit is unknown; but finite spirits are drawn to worship in spirit and in truth.
2. The knowable God. God is unintelligible, but not wholly. We feel after Him and find Him, though not the whole of His divine nature. We touch and are touched by Him on every side, and yet we do but touch the fringe of His garment of inaccessible light. A child does not know his father; and yet what would be the nature of the childs feelings if told that he did not know his father and should not love him? The child does not know and yet knows his father. The children of the eternal Father do not know and yet know. We worship a knowable God, for we worship the God and Father of Jesus Christthe God of the human nature and the Father of the divine nature. He that hath seen Christ hath seen the Father, and cannot be said to worship a God who is wholly unintelligible. Christ, by His light, reflects on the world the eternal brightness. Christ, by His superhuman excellencies manifested in this lower sphere, makes known the excellency of God. He rises infinitely above us, but He condescendingly comes forth from the infinitely vast in the person of the incarnated Son of God. He is far away beyond our comprehension, but He stoops to the worlds littleness by a revelation of His greatness in the greatness of the Saviour. Many books have been written and much study has been given about and to the life of Jesus, and still He is beyond our poor knowledge; but shall the loving bride be told that she does not know the divine Bridegroom? We know Jesus, for we live in Him and He in us. We touch His thoughts; we feel the motions of His mighty mind. We know Him sweetly and lovingly, and knowing the Christ we know the God and Father. Our sense of awe is inspired by the unknowable God. Our feeling of blessed union is fostered by the knowable God.
3. The lovable God. Gods love is unknown and yet well known to the loving nature. He comes forth from the vast unknown, and applies to Himself a well-known and familiar human term. He is the Father of Jesus Christ. God is not an unintelligible abstraction, but a father. The divine nature has in it the principle of fatherhood. From the eternal Father spring the many time fathers. He is over one vast family, and Christ Jesus is His firstborn Son. There is fatherliness in the nature and heart of the vast Unknown, and this fatherliness broods over the children of men. We worship a Father unknown as to His vastness, but known as to His love. And yet His love is unknown. Sufficient for us to know that He loves the Son, and that He loves all those who love the Son; and shall we not add that He has a love for all the earthborn? We love Him because He first loved us. We worship, we adore, we magnify a lovable God. As the sweet sun shining through the vast spaces of the great cathedral makes its sublimity attractive and cheers the whole edifice, so the sweeter sun of the Fathers love shining through the vast spaces of His profound nature renders the vastness attractive and cheers the heart of every sincere worshipper.
II. How must we worship?With one mind and one mouth. When all hearts are melted by loves sweet flame and fused into one shining unity, then all mouths will be in blessed unison. Pure and united, harmonious strains issue from a concert of well-tuned instruments; and so from the united spirits of Christian worshippers there results united worship. Love is the true musical director which can keep all the parts going harmoniously better than the baton of the best musical conductor the world has seen. The music of love is richer, vaster, and freer from discords than the music of the best earthly composers. It is difficult to get the best-trained choir to sing as with one mouth, still more difficult to secure oneness of mind; but this can be accomplished by the magical influence of love,one mouth, not because all the other mouths are closed by law, by custom, or by indifference, but because all mind and speak the same things, because all voices are sweetly blended.
III. What is to be the effect of our worship?The first great object and effect is plainly that God may be glorified by the aspect of a united worshipping community. The ideal described by the apostle is that of the union of the entire Church, composed of Jews and Gentiles, in the adoration of the God and Father who has redeemed and sanctified it by Jesus Christ. This union was, as Godet says, in a sense Pauls personal work, and the prize of his apostolic labours. How his heart must have leapt, hearing already, by the anticipation of faith, the hymn of saved humanity! It is the part of every believer, therefore, to make all the advances and all the sacrifices which love demands in order to work for so magnificent a result. Our hearts glow at the prospect; but, alas! the hymn of saved humanity is far from being a perfected composition. The number of the voices is not being increased, at least not at all in proportion to the increase of the population. In one of our largest towns only a little more than one sixth of the population was found in places of worship on the census Sunday. What shall be done for our modern Babylon, where three millions have no connection at all with religious services? We are told that in a church-going part of the country the good custom is declining. Shall we despair? By no means. But let us ask, Are our hearts right towards God? Do we need repentance and thorough reformation, lest God remove our candlestick out of its place? Have Christians the one mind of love to God and to one another? Is there the one mouth speaking only to the glory of God? Let us not seek to attract by mere outward glitter, though we are far from deprecating any attempts which may be made to render Gods house and services attractive; but let us draw by purifying the inward. Let us earnestly and believingly pray to Him whose arm is not yet shortened, and whose willingness to save is still as vast as when He gave His well-beloved Son.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON Rom. 15:5-7
Paul desires harmony.Paul desires for the Roman Christians a harmony of spirit which will fill every mouth with one song of praise and exalt God in the eyes of mankind. He knows that this cannot be unless the strong in faith deny themselves for the good of their weaker brethren. He urges this as their bounden duty, and points to the example of Christ. By the use of the word endurance he admits the difficulty of the task. But he reminds them that to prompt them to such endurance the ancient Scriptures were written. And knowing that even the divine word is powerless without the presence of the divine Speaker, he prays that God, who enables them to maintain their Christian confidence, will also give them the spirit of harmony. He desires this in order that the weak, instead of losing the little faith they have, may join with the strong in praise to God.Beet.
The advantage of a Church.Here and there an unchurched soul may stir the multitudes to lofty deeds; isolated men, strong enough to preserve their souls apart from the Church, but shortsighted enough perhaps to fail to see that others cannot, may set high examples and stimulate to national reforms. But for the rank and file of us, made of such stuff as we are made of, the steady pressures of fixed institutions, the regular diets of a common worship, and the education of public Christian teaching are too obvious safeguards of spiritual culture to be set aside. Even Renan declares his conviction that, Beyond the family and outside the State, man has need of the Church. Civil society, whether it calls itself a commune, a canton, or a province, a state or fatherland, has many duties towards the improvement of the individual; but what it does is necessarily limited. The family ought to do much more, but often it is insufficient; sometimes it is wanting altogether. The association created in the name of moral principle can alone give to every man coming into this world a bond which unites him with the past, duties as to the future, examples to follow, a heritage to receive and to transmit, and a tradition of devotion to continue. Apart altogether from the quality of its contribution to society, in the mere quantity of the work it turns out it stands alone. Even for social purposes the Church is by far the greatest employment bureau in the world. And the man who, seeing where it falls short, withholds on that account his witness to its usefulness is a traitor to history and to fact.Drummond.
Intellectual young England is against churchgoing.Intellectual young England is grandly patronising, and condescendingly allows us to attend the public services of religion if we feel so disposed. Its language is, I do not oppose churchgoing, or even say that it is undesirable. My point is merely that it is not necessary. Now necessary things are those which are requisite for a purpose. And in this sense public worship is necessary; for it is requisite for the purpose of fostering religious feeling in the individual, and for the purpose of preserving religion alive in the land. The man who says that private worship is enough, and that it is a waste of time to go to church, is not inspired with the true spirit of Christianity, which is benevolent. It is not necessary to take our meals with the family, or to join the club, or to adhere to a political party; but it is requisite for social well-being and prosperity. So that in this true sense it is necessary; and so also is it necessary with one mind and one mouth to glorify God in the hours of prayer. But it is affirmed that the Bible does not require it. St. Paul in this passage seems to regard it as an un questioned duty, and his point is to prepare the earlier believers for its right performance. Young England has a curious exposition of the direct command in Hebrews, where we are told not to forsake the assembling ourselves together. He says it does not apply to churchgoing at all, for the house of God spoken of in Rom. 15:21 is clearly not a material one. Certainly not; but it is a house on the earth, for it consists of true believers, over which Christ is the High Priest. The passage relates to a present duty which is to be performed in expectation of the approaching day. Christ, as His custom was, went to the synagogue every Sabbath day. The early Church had frequent meetings for fellowship and Christian worship. Religion must decline if the public ordinances of religion are neglected. Mere external contact with the worship of God fails indeed to secure salvation, but wilful contempt of it is the way to ruin. It is a curious feature in young England that he points to the agnostic leaders as non-churchgoers and yet as good men. Doubtless good men in the sense of being moral, but not good men in the sense of being religious and spiritual. How can an agnostic, a man who professes not to know, who willingly remains ignorant, who practically denies a God, be a good man in the highest sense? Agnosticism is not our creed, but Christianity, and we must follow Christ and His apostles and all the faithful The question arises, How much of the morality of our agnostic leaders is due to the age which has been leavened with the pure leaven of the gospel? It is very sad that too many young Englanders owe themselves to religious parents and to surrounding Christian influences, and yet ungratefully spurn the institution which has done so much for our national well-being. Our love to God and to Christ, our gratitude for saving influences, our social instincts, and our patriotism should induce us with one mind and one mouth to glorify God in the earthly house set apart to religious services. It may be difficult to speak definitely as to the reason why a nation has declined; but one of the leading concomitants of a nations fall is the decline in morals and manners, and these decline with the downfall of religion. When ancient Israel forsook God, then it became an easy prey to the oppressor. Ephesus was once the metropolis of proconsular Asia; not merely in a political, but also in an ecclesiastical sense. It is placed at the head of the seven Churches. It is reported that St. John was its bishop. But Ephesus fell. Young Ephesus said it was not necessary to go to church. The first love departed; both private and public worship was neglected. At the present day the only remains of this once pleasant city are some ruins and the village of Ajosoluck. If we would not see our great metropolis in ruins, if we would not have the desolating tread of foreign foes over our fair green landscapes, we must seek the favour and protection of the eternal God, we must support the public ordinances of religion, we must work and pray for the spread and the increase of noble Christian men and women.
The God of patience.When we say God is patient, four things are implied:
I. Provocation.Where there is nothing to try the temper, annoy, or irritate, there can be no patience. Humanity provokes God. The provocation is great, universal, constant. Measure His patience by the provocation.
II. Sensibility.Where there is no tenderness of nature, no susceptibility of feeling, there may be obduracy and stoicism, but no patience. Patience implies feeling. God is infinitely sensitive. He feels the provocation. Oh, do not this abominable thing, etc.
III. Knowledge.Where the provocation is not known, however great and however sensitive the being against whom it is directed, there can be no patience. God knows all the provocations.
IV. Power.Where a being has not the power to resent an insult or to punish a provocation, though he may feel it and know it, his forbearing is not patienceit is simple weakness. He is bound by the infirmity of his nature to be passive. God is all-powerful.Homilist.
The God of peace.Whatever may be the amount of agitation in the universe, there is one Being sublimely pacific, without one ripple upon the clear and fathomless river of His nature. Three things are implied in this:
I. That there is nothing malign in His nature.Wherever there is any jealousy, wrath, or malice of any description, there can be no peace. Malevolence in any form or degree is soul-disturbing. In whatever mind it exists it is like a tide in the ocean, producing eternal restlessness. There is nothing malign in the infinite heart. He is love.
II. That there is nothing remorseful in His nature.Wherever conscience accuses of wrong, there is no peace. All compunctions, self-accusations, are soul-distuibing. Moral self complaisance is essential to spirit peace. God is light. He has never done wrong, and His infinite conscience smiles upon Him and blesses Him with peace.
III. That there is nothing apprehensive in His nature.Wherever there is a foreboding of evil, there is a mental disturbance. Fear is essentially an agitating principle. The Infinite has no fear. He is the absolute master of His position.Homilist.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 15
Rom. 15:5-6. Glorify God.I do not wonder that the men nowadays who do not believe the Bible are so very sad when they are in earnest. A writer in one of our reviews tells that he was studying the poems of Matthew Arnold, who believed, not in a living God, but in a something or other, which somehow or other, at sometime or other, makes for righteousness. The sad and hopeless spirit of the poet passed for the time into the reviewer, and he felt most miserable. He went out for a walk. It was a bleak, wintry day, and he was then at Brodrick, in Arran. The hills were in a winding-sheet of snow, above which arose a ghastly array of clouds. The sky was of a leaden hue, and the sea was making its melancholy moan amid the jagged, dripping rocks. The gloom without joined the gloom within, and made him very wretched. He came upon some boys shouting merrily at play. Are you at the school? he asked. Yes, was the reply. And what are you learning? I learn, said one, what is the chief end of man. And what is it? the reviewer asked. The boy replied, Mans chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy Him for ever. He at once felt that the boy was taught a religion of grandeur and joy, while the poets was a religion of darkness and despair.J. Wells.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
(5) Now the God of patience and consolation.Such, then, should be the temper of the Roman Christians. The Apostle prays that along with the spirit of steadfast endurance God will also give them that spirit of unanimity which proceeds from singleness of aim. There seems, at first sight, to be little or no connection between the God of patience and consolation and the being likeminded. They are connected, however, through the idea of singleness of purpose. He who is wholly self-dedicated to Christ, and who in the strength of that self-dedication is able to endure persecution, will also have a close bond of union with all who set before themselves the same object.
Consolation. . . .The same word as comfort in the previous verse.
To be likeminded. . . .To have the same thoughts, feelings, sentiments, hopes, and aims.
According to Christ Jesus.The conforming to that spirit of Christ which it is to be assumed that all who call themselves Christians have put on.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
5. Likeminded From this mutual bearing with each other the apostle passes to its blessed result, the unity of the heart of the Church. For this he offers his prayer to the God whose qualities are the very patience and consolation which the Scriptures proffer to the enduring Christian.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Now the God of patience and of comfort grant you to be of the same mind one with another according to Christ Jesus, that with one accord you may with one mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.’
The source of this patient endurance and encouragement obtained through the Scriptures is in fact God, for He is the God of patient endurance and encouragement (comfort). And Paul prays that He, as such a God might grant to them to be of the same mind one with another, giving them patient endurance and encouragement, thereby enabling them to bear with each other’s weaknesses and to demonstrate a unity that results from consideration towards one another, ‘in accordance with Christ Jesus’, that is, by following His example and being like Him.
And the hoped for consequence is that they might in full accord and speak as one as they glorify the God and Father of our LORD Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ laid great emphasis on the need for such unity. It was to be the wonder of the world as they said, ‘see how these Christians love one another’ (Joh 13:34-35; Joh 15:12; Joh 17:21-23). It was a result worth making sacrifices for. The aim was so that they would concentrate on what was really important, the united worship of God and the bringing home to the world of the glory of God and the glory of Christ.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Rom 15:5. Grant you to be like-minded The original properly signifies, “To agree in an harmonious and affectionate manner;” and might be read, Grant you or give you the same mutual affection, according to the example of Jesus Christ. See Raphelius, and Gal 4:28, 1Pe 1:15, Eph 4:24.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Rom 15:5 . ] leading over to the wish that God may grant them the concord which it was the design of the previous exhortation , Rom 15:1-4 , to establish.
The characteristic designation of God as the author of the perseverance and of the consolation , [13] is intended not merely to supply an external connection with Rom 15:4 , but stands in an internal relation to the following to , since this cannot exist if men’s minds are not patient and consoled, so that they do not allow themselves to be disturbed by anything adverse in the like effort which must take place in their mutual fellowship ( .). Through this identity ( , comp. on Rom 12:16 ) of purpose and endeavour there exists in a church , Act 4:32 .
On the form , instead of the older Attic , see Lobeck, ad Phryn. p. 346; Khner, I. p. 644.
. .] conformably to Christ . Either Christ is conceived as the regulative ideal of the frame of mind, according to which each is to adjust himself for his part in the common ; or: according to the will of Christ (comp. Joh 17:21 ), like , Rom 8:27 . The first is to be preferred, since the model of Christ, Rom 15:3 (comp. Rom 15:7 ), is still the conception present to the apostle’s mind. Comp. Col 2:8 ; Phi 2:5 ; , 2Co 11:17 , is somewhat different.
[13] Calvin aptly remarks: “Solus sane Deus patientiae et consolationis auctor est, quia utrumque cordibus nostris instillat per Spiritum suum; verbo tamen suo velut instrumento ad id utitur.”
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
Sixth Section.Exhortation to unanimity on the part of all the members of the Church, to the praise of God and on the ground of Gods grace, in which Christ has accepted both Jews and Gentiles. Reference to the destination of all nations to glorify God, even according to the Old Testament, and encouragement of the Roman Christians to an immeasurable hope in regard to this, according to their calling
Rom 15:5-13
5Now the God of patience and consolation [comfort] grant you to be likeminded [of the same mind] one toward another according to Christ Jesus:6That ye may with one mind and one mouth [with one accord ye may with one mouth] glorify God, even the Father [or, the God and Father]6 of our Lord Jesus Christ. 7Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us 8[you],7 to the glory of God.8 Now [For]9 I say that Jesus [omit Jesus]10 Christ was [hath been made]11 a minister of the circumcision for the truth [for the sake of Gods truth] of God, to [in order to] confirm the promises madeunto the fathers: 9And that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy; as it is written,
For this cause I will confess [give thanks] to thee among the Gentiles,
And sing unto thy name.
10, 11And again he saith,12 Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people. And again,13
Praise the Lord, all ye Gentiles;
And laud14 him, all ye people.
12And again, Esaias [Isaiah] saith,15
There shall be a root of Jesse,
And he that shall rise [riseth] to reign over the Gentiles;
In him shall the Gentiles trust [hope].
13Now [And may] the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace16 in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through [, in] the power of the Holy Ghost.
EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL
The positive destination of the Christian Church at Rome.
Rom 15:5. Now the God of patience, &c. [ , … God, who is the author of patience, &c. So Hodge, Meyer, and most. Luther: Scriptura quidem docet, sed gratia donat, quod illa docet. Comp. Calvin on the patience of the Christian. De Wette, Meyer, and others, understand by , constancy. Hodge takes consolation as the source of patience.R.] God is the common, inexhaustible source of all the matured patience of the New Testament, and of all the preparatory comfort of the Old Testament; and it is from Him that believers must derive the gift of being of the same mind one toward another according to Christ Jesus (not according to His example and will merely, but according to His Spirit).17
Rom 15:6. It is only in this path of self-humiliation that they shall and can attain to the glorious way of glorifying the God and Father of our Lord Jesus ChristHim who has glorified Jesus as Christ, after Christ passed through the Jesus-way of humiliation, and whom they glorify in the anticipation that He will glorify them with Him, as He has already glorified them in Him. The terms Christ Jesus and Jesus Christ are here reversed with remarkable acuteness and effect.With one accord, , is not explained by the phrase: with one mouth [ ], but the former is the source of the latter, as Meyer has correctly observed, against Reiche. [When God is so praised that the same mood impels every one to the same utterance of praise, then party-feeling is banished, and unanimity has found its most sacred expression (Meyer).R.]
The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ [ .] He is not only the Father, but also the God, of Christ, in the highest specific sense (thus Grotius [Bengel, Reiche, Fritzsche, Jowett], and others, in opposition to Meyer). Comp. Eph 1:17.
[God, even the Father, &c. The E. V. thus renders, disconnecting of our Lord Jesus Christ from God. So De Wette, Philippi, Meyer, Stuart, Webster and Wilkinson. Hodge, Tholuck, and Alford, leave the question undecided. It would seem that either view is admissible grammatically; is often used epexegetically, even, and the article (standing before only) may merely bind the two terms, God and Father of Christ (Meyer). At the same time, the article might be looked for before , were explicative. Nor is there any doctrinal difficulty occasioned by either view. The only reason in my own mind for preferring the interpretation of the E. V. is, that those exegetes, who are most delicate in their perceptions of grammatical questions, adopt it. See Meyer in loco.R.]
Rom 15:7. Wherefore receive ye one another [ ]. In the intensive sense. An exhortation to both parties.
As Christ also received you [ . See Textual Note2.] This is more definitely explained in Rom 15:8-9.
To the glory of God [ . See Textual Note3.] This must be referred to Christs reception of them, and not to the exhortation: receive ye one another, according to Chrysostom, and others.18 That God might be glorified. Not immediately, in order that we may share the Divine glory with Christ (Grotius, Beza, and others), although the glorification of God shall consist in that. As the self-humiliation of Christ, which was proved by His receiving men into His fellowship, led to the glorification of God (see John xvii.), so also, according to the previous verse, shall the same conduct of self-humiliation on the part of Christians have the same effect. But how has Christ received us into His fellowship? Answer:
Rom 15:8. For I say [ . See Textual Note4.] The Apostle now explains how Christ received the Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians into fellowship with himself.That Christ [. See Textual Note5.] The reading Christ, as a designation of Gods Son, in view of the incarnation. In this view He hath been made a minister of the circumcision [ . See Textual Note6. Dr. Lange, in his German text of this verse, thus explains this phrase: from a higher, Divine-human, ideal point of view, receiving the Jews into His fellowship, by submitting himself to circumcision.R.] His concrete incarnation as a Jew, in which He became subject to the Jewish law (see Php 2:7; Gal 4:4), must be distinguished from His incarnation in the more general sense. By this means, He, as the heavenly Strong One, through voluntary love entered into the fellowship of the infinitely weak in both a human and legal sense, and accordingly received them into His fellowship. It seems far-fetched to regard the circumcision here (with Meyer [Philippi, Hodge], and others) as an abstract idea for the circumcised.19 The circumcision denotes the law; and as He freely became a minister of the law, He also became a ministering companion of the Jews; Mat 20:28. Therefore it is not the theocratic honor of the Jews which is emphasized here (Meyer) [Philippi], but the condescension to serve them. [So Hodge. is in emphatic position. The view of the emphasis taken by Meyer seems confirmed by what follows, which sets forth an advantage of the Jews.R.]
For the sake of Gods truth [. For the sake of the truthfulness of God, in order to justify and to prove it by means of the fulfilment of the promises of the Old Testament.R.] This undoubtedly seems to express the advantage of the Jews; but it also indicates their perilous condition. His condescension had a twofold cause: Gods mercy, and His promises resting upon it. Principially, His mercy took the precedence; but historically, the promise preceded. The truthfulness of God had to be sealed; He must confirm the promises given to the fathers by fulfilling them, however unfortunate the condition of the posterity; must confirm them in a way finally valid, for, as such sealed promises, they still continue in force, according to chap. 11., especially to believers (see 2Co 1:20; Rev 3:14).
Rom 15:9. And that the Gentiles, &c. [ .] Christ had to receive the Jews, acting as a minister to them through His whole life; and He had to confine himself to historical labors among them, not so much because they were worthy of it, as to fulfil the promises given to the fathers. But the Gentiles were now the object of utterly unmerited mercy. The thought that Christ has redeemed the Gentiles through pure mercy, which was not yet historically pledged to them (for the promises in the Old Testament in relation to the Gentiles were not pledges to the Gentiles themselves), now passes immediately over into the representation of the fact that the Gentiles have already come to glorify God as believers, in which they have an advantage on their side also. The meaning of is, that mercy could not help satisfying itself for its own sake, by redemption. The has been translated by Rckert [De Wette, Hodge, Alford], and others: have glorified; by Kllner [Calvin, Tholuck], and Philippi: should glorify. See Meyer on this point, p. 517.20 The aorist says, at all events, that they have decidedly begun to glorify God.
For this cause I will give thanks to thee, &c. [ , … Verbatim from the LXX., except that is omitted here. On the verb, see Rom 14:11, p.R.] Meyer aptly says: The historical subject of the passage, David, is the type of Christ, and the latter (not the Gentile Christian, with Fritzsche; nor the collective term for the Gentile apostles, with Reiche; nor any messenger of salvation to the world, with Philippi) is therefore, in Pauls sense, the prophetical subject; Christ promises that He will glorify God among the Gentiles (surrounded by believing Gentiles) for His mercy ( = ). But this is the plastic description of glorifying on the part of the Gentiles themselves, which takes place in the name of the Lord Jesus, and through Him (Col 3:17).
Rom 15:10. Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people [ . See Textual Note7, for the Hebrew text.R.] Deu 32:43. From the LXX., which reads for , probably following another reading: ; Meyer. On the impossibility of understanding, by Goim, the single tribes of Israel, which De Wette does, comp. Tholuck, p. 730. [Also Philippi, whose remarks on this citation are unusually full and valuable.R.] According to the theocratic idea, the definitions: rejoice to his people, or rather, make his people rejoice (), ye Gentiles, and rejoice with his people, amount to the same thing.
Rom 15:11. Praise the Lord; Psa 117:1. [An exact citation from the LXX. See Textual Notes 8 and 9, however.R.] A prophecy of the universal spread of salvation.
Rom 15:12. And again, Isaiah saith. [See Textual Note10.] In Rom 11:10 : According to the LXX., which, however, has translated the original text so freely that the twofold dominion of the Messiah is indicated, on the one hand, over the Jews (as the root of Jesse), and, on the other, over the Gentiles.
A root of Jesse [ ]. See Isa 11:1. The tree of the royal house of David being cut down, the Messiah arose from the root of the house, which is symbolized by Jesse. In a higher sense, Christ was indeed the holy root of Jesse, and of the house of David itself.
Rom 15:13. And may the God of hope. A grand description of God here, where the object is to remind the Roman Christians to lead a life in perfect accordance with their universal calling. To this also belongs the duty of looking confidently and prayerfully to the God of hope, the God of that future of salvation which is so infinitely rich, both extensively and intensively.
With all joy and peace. From that hope, the highest possible evangelical, saving joy, shall spring; the result of this shall be the richest measure of peace, and the harmony and unanimity of faith. This shall take place in believing (, it is not by unbelief, or by abridging our faith, that the unity of Christianity should be sought), and accordingly these two spiritual blessings shall ever produce a richer hope, not in human power and according to a human measure, but in the inward measure and divine power of the Holy Ghost.[21]
Therefore the realization of hope should not be striven for by the aid of earthly and even infernal powers: one shepherd and one fold! According to Grotius, the end of this hope is harmony; according to Tholuck, the immediate end is the gracious gifts of Gods kingdom; while the ultimate end is the regnum glori. However, there lies just between these the end which the Apostle here has in viewthat by the aid of the Church at Rome, in their fellowship with Paul, all nations shall be brought, by the spread of faith, to glorify God; Eph 1:18 ff.
DOCTRINAL AND ETHICAL
1. The great grounds of the profound and perfect harmony and unanimity of Christians, a. God as the God of patience and comfort; that is, as the God of the infinite power of passive and active love; b. The pattern, the spirit, the power, and the work of Christ; c. The design that Christians, by being like-minded, and by aiming at substantial fellowship in God and in Christ (as created and redeemed), should find also the ethical fellowship of harmony and unanimity.
2. The universal fellowship into which Christ has entered with humanity, and the special fellowship in which He has pledged himself to the Jews, constitute the basis for the most special and real fellowship into which He, through His grace, has entered with believers. But it is a grievous offence to refuse communion with him whom Christ, by the witness of faith and of confession, has communion, or to abridge and prejudice hearty intercourse with those whom God, in Christ, deems worthy of His fellowship. [Rom 15:7 seems to be a dictum probans for what is termed open communion.R.]
3. On the antithesis: Christ Jesus and Jesus Christ, see the Exeg. Notes.
4. It is also clear here (see Rom 15:8) that we must distinguish between the ideal incarnation of Christ in itself, and His concrete incarnation in Judaism, and, generally, in the form of a servant.
5. God is free in His grace, and yet also bound in His truth, for He has bound himself to His promises. But this obligation is the highest glory of His freedom. His truthfulness had to satisfy His word, but His mercy had to satisfy itself.
6. The riches of the Old Testament in promises for the Jews, and the high aim of these promises: a world of nations praising the Lord.
7. The God of patience, comfort, hope. All such terms define God to be infinite, and infinite as a fountain, as self-communicating life, and archetype of life. So also is the Holy Spirit defined as the Spirit of truth, &c. See the beautiful remark of Gerlach, below. But the highest thing for which we can praise God, according to Rom 15:6, is His being the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Not only is He His Father in the specific sense, but also His God; the glorious God of His consciousness and life is the true God in perfect revelation, and consequently shall become our God through Him.
8. On the development of hope, within the sphere of faith, into joy and peace, and, by means of peace, into an ever richer hope, see the Exeg. Notes. It is only in this way that irenics can be conducted in the power of the Holy Ghost, and not with the modern artifice of attempting them outside the sphere of faith, beyond all creeds, and with the theory of unconscious Christianity, or even with the violent measures of the Middle Ages. The Apostle says: In the power of the Holy Ghost.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
Jewish and Gentile Christians should agree for Christs sake, who has received them both.Christian harmony. 1. It comes from the God of patience and comfort; 2. It is shaped according to the pattern and will of Jesus Christ; 3. It expresses itself in harmonious praise of God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ (Rom 15:5-6).A harmonious and fraternal disposition is a source of the joyous praise of God, which is not disturbed by a discordant note (Rom 15:5-6).Jesus Christ a minister of the circumcision. 1. Why? For the truth of God, to confirm the promise. 2. How? In obedience to the Divine law, for freedom from the law (Rom 15:8).Receive one another, as Christ also received us, to the glory of God. Every thing to Gods glory, and not to our own (Rom 15:7).The praise of God out of the mouth of Gentiles: 1. Established in Gods mercy; 2. Resounding in many tongues; 3. Ascending to heaven (Rom 15:9).Gods mercy toward the Gentiles: 1. Present from the beginning; 2. Declared by the prophets; 3. Manifested in Christ (Rom 15:9-13). Rom 15:13 is an appropriate text and theme for addresses on occasions of confirmation or marriage.
Starke: In Christ, souls are worth so much that God receives them, just as men hoard gold and silver, pearls and gems; Isa 43:4 (Rom 15:7).Mller: Patience does not increase in the garden of nature, but it is Gods gift and grace; God is the real Master who creates it (Rom 15:5).Because Christ is a root, He must vegetate, bloom, and bring forth fruit in us (Rom 15:12).
Gerlach: God is the source of all good things, and since He not merely has them, but they are His real essence; since He does not have love and omnipotence, but is actually love and omnipotence themselves, so can He be denominated according to every glorious attribute and gift which He possesses. The advantage which the Gentiles thought that they possessed in their polytheism, when they, for example, worshipped a deity of truth, of hope, &c., is possessed in a much more certain and effective way by the believing Christian, when he perceives, in a vital manner, that the true God is himself personal faithfulness, hope, and love, and thus has all these attributes just as if He had nothing else but them (Rom 15:5).
Heubner: The harmony of hearts is the real soul and power of worship (Rom 15:6).Christ is the centre of the Holy Scriptures (Rom 15:8).Christ is the bond of all nations (Rom 15:12).God alone is the source of all life and blessing in the Church. The means is faith, as the ever new appropriation of saving blessings; from this arises the enjoyment of peace and of all blessed joysan overflow of hope. But every thing is brought to pass by the Holy Spirit (Rom 15:13).
Besser: The Scriptures are a book of patience and comfort (Rom 15:5.)Every thing which is true joy in this life, is a foretaste of the joy of eternal lifejoy in the Lord and His word, joy in all His blessings, which make body and soul happy, &c. All true peace in this world of contention and anxiety, is a preliminary enjoyment of the peace in the kingdom of glory.
Schleiermacher: The limitation in the labors of our Saviour himself, when we look at His person, and the greater freedom and expansion in the labors of His disciples. 1. Treatment; 2. Application (Rom 15:8-9).
Rom 15:4-13. The Pericope for the Second Sunday in Advent.Schultz: On the likeness of Christ and His redeemed ones. 1. In what respect has Christ become like us? 2. In what respect should we become like Christ? a. In patience and humility; b. In the respect and love with which He treated all men; c. In the joyful faith and peaceful hope with which He overcame the world.Riemer: What must there be among Christians, in order that the Church of Christ may stand? 1. One foundation; 2. A harmonious mouth; 3. A common bond.Brandt: To what does the season of Advent exhort us? 1. To the industrious examination of what has been written; 2. To the unanimous praise of God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, for all that has been already fulfilled; 3. To an attentive waiting for the future coming of Gods kingdom.Heubner: The unity of the Christian Church. 1. In what does it consist? 2. What binds us to it?The Bible the bond of the Christian Church. 1. Proof: It is the bond, a. In faith, or in doctrine; b. In the holy sense, or in love; c. In worship; d. In daily life. 2. Application, a. A warning against despising the Bible, and an admonition to maintain its authority; b. A dissemination of its use; c. Our own proper use of it.The Bible the treasure of the evangelical Church.The inward unity of true Christians amid outward diversity.
[Burkitt: The Christians hope: 1. God is its object, and therefore the sin of despair is most unreasonable; for why should any despair of His mercy who is the God of hope, who commands us to hope in His mercy, and takes pleasure in them that do ?Song of Solomon 2. The grace of hope, together with joy and peace in believing, are rooted in the Christians heart, through the power of the Holy Ghostthat is, through the sanctifying influences of the Holy Ghostenlightening the understanding, inclining the will, rectifying the affections, and reducing all the rebellious powers and faculties of the soul in concurrence with our endeavors under the government and dominion of reason and religion.
[Henry: The method of faith is: 1. To seek Christ as one proposed to us for a Saviour; 2. And, finding Him able and willing to save, then to trust in Him. They that know Him will trust in Him. Or, this seeking Him is the effect of a trust in Him, seeking Him by prayer and pursuant endeavors. Trust, is the mother; diligence in the use of means, the daughter.What is laid out upon Christians is but little compared with what is laid up for them.Doddridge: Nothing can furnish so calm a peace and so sublime a joy as Christian hope.That is the most happy and glorious circumstance in the station which Providence may have assigned us, which gives us the greatest opportunity of spreading the honor of so dear a name, and of presenting praises and services to God through Him.
Kollock, Sermon on the patience of God: I. The nature of this patience, or slowness to anger: (1) It is a modification of the Divine goodness; (2) It is not the result of ignorance; (3) It is not the result of impotence; (4) It is not the result of a connivance at sin, or a resolution to suffer it with impunity; (5) But it is grounded on the everlasting covenant, and the blood of Jesus. II. Some of the most illustrious manifestations of it. III. The reasons why God exercises it: (1) He is patient because of His benignity; (2) In order that this perfection may be glorified; (3). In consequence of the prayers of pious ancestors; (4) Because the wicked are often mixed with the pious, and nearly related to them; (5) The number of His elect is not yet completed; (6) The measure of the sins of the wicked is not yet filled up; (7) That sinners may be brought to repentance; (8) That sinners who continue impenitent may at last be without excuse; (9) That His power may be displayed; (10) That He may exercise the trust of His servants in Him. IV. The effects that the belief and knowledge of it should produce upon our hearts and lives: (1) Because of Gods patience we should love Him; (2) We should repent; (3) We should imitate Him; (4) His patience should be our comfort; (5) We should grieve at the reproaches and insults cast upon God.
[Homiletical Literature on Rom 15:13 : Hugh Binning, Works, vol. iii. 249; R. Lucas, Joy, Peace, and Hope, the Christians Portion Here, Serm. (1709), vol. ii. 119; Bishop Moore, Excellency of the Christian Religion, Serm., vol. ii. 291; James Craig, Serm., vol. ii. 355; J. Dodson, Joy in Believing, Disc., 184; Daniel De Superville. (le fils), Les Fruits consolans de la Foi, Serm., vol. iii. 328; R. Moss, Nature and Qualification of Christian Hope, Serm., vol. vi. 325; Price, Peace of Conscience, Hope, and Holy Joy, Berry St. SS., vol. i. 419; S. Ogden, The Being of the Holy Ghost, Serm., 157; W. Mason, The Effects of the Divine Spirit, Works, vol. iv. 147; H. Hunter, The Belief of the Gospel a Source of Joy and Peace, Serm. (1795), vol. i. 227; David Savile, Present Happiness of Believers, Disc., 401; W. Gilpin, Sermons, 165; C. Simeon, The Holy Ghost the Author of Hope, Works, vol. xv. 553; G. DOyly, Joy and Peace in Believing, vol. i. 385; W. Blackley, Script. Teaching, 263; W. Gresley, Joy and Peace in Believing, Practical Serm., 41; E. Blencowe, Hope, Plain Serm., vol. ii. 80; H. Goodwin, The Young Man in Religious Difficulties, Four Serm., 35.J. F. H.]
Footnotes:
[6]Rom 15:6.[On the two renderings given above, see the Exeg. Notes.
[7]Rom 15:7.[The Rec., with B. D1.: ; . A. C. D2 3. F. L., most versions and many fathers: . All modern editors adopt the latter. Besides the overwhelming MS. support, there is the additional reason, that might so readily enter as a correct gloss, since the reference is undoubtedly to both Jewish and Gentile Christians. See the Exeg. Notes.
[8]Rom 15:7.[The Rec., on very insufficient authority, omits before ; inserted in . A. B. C. D. F. G.
[9]Rom 15:8.[Instead of , which is found in . A. B. C. D. F., versions and fathers, the Rec. (with L. and Peshito) reads: . The latter reading probably arose from a misunderstanding of the connection (Alford), or because is so common with Paul (Meyer). The former is now generally adopted (from Griesbach to Tregelles). Phillippi thinks a decision impossible!
[10]Rom 15:8.[D. F., Syriac versions, Rec., insert before ; some authorities (including Vulgate), after .; omitted in . A. B. C., fathers; rejected by Lachmann, Tischendorf, De Wette, Alford. The variation in position is decidedly against it, making an interpolation extremely probable. Dr. Lange thinks the connection favors the omission.
[11]Rom 15:8.[. A. C2. D3. L., many fathers: ; adopted by De Wette, Philippi, Meyer, Alford, Lange. B. C1. D1. F.: , adopted by Lachmann and Tregelles. The former is to be preferred, because the was likely to be omitted, and the latter might have been substituted as a correction.
[12] Rom 15:10.[From the LXX., Deu 32:43. The Hebrew text is: , literally, Rejoice, O ye nations. His people. It is not necessary, in order to defend the rendering of the LXX., to suppose that they read or or (although the last has been found). They could find the sense they have adopted in the Hebrew text as ft stands, by simply repeating the imperative (in thought) before . See Philippi in loco, and Hengstenberg, on Psa 18:50.
[13]Rom 15:11.[B. D. F. read ; omitted in . A. C. L., fathers. It was easily inserted from Rom 15:10. Lachmann adopts it, but it is generally rejected.The order of the Rec.: is probably a correction to conform with the LXX. . A. B. D, Vulgate, Syriac, &c.: . . . . So Lachmann, Tischendorf, Alford, Tregelles.
[14]Rom 15:11.[. A. B. C.: . So Lachmann, Tischendorf, Meyer, De Wette, Alford, Tregelles, Lange. Rec., F. L., versions: (so LXX., although the MSS. vary). Philippi adopts the latter, but he is a conservative as respects the Recepta.
[15] Rom 15:12.[The LXX. (Isa 11:10) is followed here. It differs somewhat from the Hebrew, which reads:
.
Literally: And in that day shall the root of Jesse which (is) standing (or set up) be for a signal to the nations; unto Him shall the Gentiles seek (J. A. Alexander). But the LXX. only strengthens this into a form well suited to the Apostles purpose.
[16]Rom 15:13.[F. G. read: . So B., inserting before the datives. . A. C. D. L.: ; accepted by most editors.R.]
[17][With this accords the view of Dr. Hodge: The expression, to be like-minded, does not here refer to unanimity of opinion, but to harmony of feeling; see chaps. Rom 8:5; Rom 12:3. The context favors this very decidedly.Meyer thinks the example of Christ (Rom 15:3) is still the ruling thought; but it is certainly not the exclusive one. The verb is the latter Hellenistic form for .R.]
[18][Dr. Hodge seems to prefer the other reference, while Dr. Lange really adopts both in his further remarks. Dr. Hodge does not decide which reading he adopts, or ; but says that, if the former he the true reading, Paul is exhorting the Gentile converts to forbearance toward their Jewish brethren. This view is rejected by most of the later commentators, for both parties are addressed, as the context shows. Because Paul often means Gentiles when he says , we need not hold that he always uses it in this sense.R.]
[19][This view can scarcely be deemed far-fetched, when it is so readily suggested by the antithesis, (Rom 15:9). and when Paul so frequently uses the term in this sense (comp. Rom 3:20; Gal 2:7 ff.; Eph 2:11; Col 3:11).R.]
[20] [The aorist infinitive has occasioned some trouble among the grammarians.
1. It has been taken as dependent on (Rom 15:8). So Winer, p. 311, Hodge, Alford, De Wette, Philippi; but in different senses: (a.) I say that the Gentiles have praised God (at their conversion). So Alford, Hodge, De Wette. But this is both contrary to the usage with the aorist infinitive, and introduces a thought that does not seem to belong here naturally. (b.) I say that the Gentiles ought to praise God (Calvin, Philippi, Tholuck). But there is no idea of obligation introduced in Rom 15:8 which is parallel to this. (c.) I say that the Gentiles praise (indefinitely). So Winer, Fritzsche. But to this there are grammatical objections. Besides this, all these involve an incorrect view of the dependence of the infinitive.
2. The simplest, most natural view, is that of the E. V., Meyer, &c. The infinitive stands next to a clause where there is also an aorist infinitive (); it is therefore cordinate with this, depending also on , though expressing the more remote purpose: Christ was made a minister, &c., in order to confirm the promises, and as a result of this, that the Gentiles might praise God for His mercy.R.]
[21][Meyer renders: in virtue of the (inworking) power of the Holy Ghost. Our E. V., usually so apt, is peculiarly unfortunate in its treatment of the preposition , which it readers through in this case. The later revisions have by. But it is to be doubted whether ever has a strictly instrumental force. The peculiar meaning, in, always remains in it. So here, in believing, in the power of the Holy Ghost; the former expressing the subjective, and the latter, the objective means, yet the former sets forth the status, in which (glubigsein) they are, and the latter an inworking power. Comp. Philippi.R.]
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
DISCOURSE: 1920
PREFERRING THE GOOD OF OTHERS
Rom 15:5-6. Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: that ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. [Note: A Sketch extemporaneously given to a young friend.] IN order to glorify God, we should deny ourselves for the benefit of others.
In the apostolical Churches there were many evils to be corrected. These arose, partly from the vast diversity of states from which the converts were brought to unite with each other in one Church; but they arose also, more particularly, from the corruptions of the human heart. Selfishness is not peculiar to any age or place, but extends itself through the whole race of mankind; and to correct this is one of the great objects of the Gospel of Christ. For the correction of it the Scriptures supply the richest instruction: for the correction of it they exhibit also the brightest example. To both of these we are directed in the passage before us.
We will consider,
I.
The example of Christ here proposed to us
[To enter into this we must consider the state in which our blessed Lord was from all eternity; his glory and felicity in the bosom of his Father. What would he have done had he considered only his own. happiness? He would have left the world in the same way as he did the fallen angels. But how did he act? He assumed our nature in its fallen state; submitted to all the evils incident to that state; endured the contradiction of sinners throughout his life; bore the very wrath of God himself even unto death; and by this has redeemed our souls from death, and restored us to the favour of our offended God. Thus, instead of pleasing himself and disregarding us, he disregarded himself to benefit us.]
II.
The obligation that lies upon us to follow it
[Our blessed Lord is set forth as an example to us: in the above respects we need more especially to follow him. Man as fallen, thinks of nothing but his own personal gratification: man, as redeemed, continues also but a selfish creature. Self-denial is a grace which we are very averse to exercise: we press even duty to the side of self-indulgence, and enlist conscience in the service of our own lusts. But love should be seated on the throne of our hearts; its dictates alone should be followed in all things. The waving the felicity of heaven for a season, and incurring for a season the pains of hell, would scarcely be too high a standard to aim at for the good of others. This was our Lords example; and in this we should endeavour to follow his steps [Note: Php 2:4-5.].]
III.
The high attainments to which we should aspire in the prosecution of it
[The want of this spirit produces much disunion in the Church, and brings much dishonour to God; the exercise of this spirit renders the Church a prelude to heaven. To glorify God should be the one object of all; and in this there should be one heart, one mind, one faith, throughout the whole. To the attainment of this should every one aspire, and to contribute towards it should be the one labour of his life.
But it may be asked, How can all this ever be attained? how can creatures, who have so little natural forbearance, in whose minds there is such a proneness to irritation and disquietude, ever be brought to such a state as this? Truly, if we looked into ourselves, our state would be hopeless; but in God there is all that we stand in need of. Need we patience? He is a God of patience; possessed of it in all its fulness. Does such a fulness of comfort appear beyond the reach of mortal man? God is a God of comfort also; ready to bestow it out of his own inexhaustible, immeasurable fulness; and to him we are here directed to lift up our eyes, in earnest and assured expectation. There is nothing which he cannot work in the mind of man. He who wrote his law on tablets of stone, can write it on the fleshy tables of our hearts: he who upheld his own law in all that he did and suffered, can effect the same blessed work in us also; and this he has promised to his Church and people; has promised it by covenant and by oath. Look to him then as your covenant God and Father; plead with him the glory that will result to himself from the exercise of these graces; and, in dependence on his strength, go forth to the fulfilment of this duty: Seek not your own things; prefer others in honour before yourselves; seek not even your own profit, as abstracted from that of others, but seek the profit of many, that they may be saved; and know that the more you deny yourselves for the benefit of others, the more you will resemble Christ, and glorify your God.]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
5 Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus:
Ver. 5. Now the God of patience ] The soul is then only in good plight when the heaven answers the earth, Hos 2:21 ; when Christ the Sun of righteousness shines into it.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
5, 6. ] Further introduction of the subject, by a prayer that God, who has given the Scriptures for these ends, might grant them unanimity, that they might with one accord shew forth His glory . In the title given to God, the and just mentioned are taken up again: q. d. “The God who alone can give this patience and comfort.”
The later form of the opt., , is also found 2Ti 1:16 ; 2Ti 1:18 ; Eph 1:17 al., in LXX Gen 27:28 ; Gen 28:4 al. See Winer, edn. 6, 14.1. g.
. , according to (the spirit and precepts of) Christ Jesus , see reff.
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Rom 15:5 Paul returns to his point in a prayer: the God of the patience and comfort just spoken of grant unto you, etc. : cf. Rom 12:16 , where, however, with is not quite the same. Paul wishes here that the minds of his readers their moral judgment and temper may all be determined by Jesus Christ (for , expressing the rule according to which, see chap. Rom 8:27 ): in this case there will be the harmony which the disputes of chap. 14 disturbed.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
God. App-98.
consolation = comfort, as Rom 15:4.
likeminded. See Rom 12:16.
one . . . another = among (App-104) yourselves.
according to. App-104.
Christ Jesus. See Rom 8:1.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
5, 6.] Further introduction of the subject, by a prayer that God, who has given the Scriptures for these ends, might grant them unanimity, that they might with one accord shew forth His glory. In the title given to God, the and just mentioned are taken up again: q. d. The God who alone can give this patience and comfort.
The later form of the opt., , is also found 2Ti 1:16; 2Ti 1:18; Eph 1:17 al., in LXX Gen 27:28; Gen 28:4 al. See Winer, edn. 6, 14.1. g.
. , according to (the spirit and precepts of) Christ Jesus,-see reff.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Rom 15:5. , The God of patience and consolation) So, the God of hope, Rom 15:13, the God of peace, Rom 15:33. Titles from the thing, which is treated of. Elsewhere, the God of glory, the God of order, the God of the living, the God of heaven.- – -) So plainly, Php 2:1-2.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Rom 15:5
Rom 15:5
Now the God of patience and of comfort grant you to be of the same mind one with another according to Christ Jesus: -Now may God, who is patient and forbears long, and who gives patience and consolation in trials and self-denials, enable you to have the same mind to suffer for and help one another that Jesus Christ had to help man in sin and ruin. [Let each be so conformed to Christ that all may be of one mind among yourselves. For such, harmony, patience, and comfort are needed. Only the God of patience and comfort can produce these, but he produces them through the Scriptures. No comment here is equal to Pauls own words: Make full my joy, that ye be of the same mind, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind; doing nothing through faction or “a natural moral balance”through vainglory, but in lowliness of mind each counting other better than himself; not looking each of you to his own things, but each of you also to the things of others. Have this mind in you, which was also in Christ Jesus (Php 2:2-5), when he humbled himself for us.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
the God: Rom 15:13, Exo 34:6, Psa 86:5, 1Pe 3:20, 2Pe 3:9, 2Pe 3:15
consolation: 2Co 1:3, 2Co 1:4, 2Co 7:6
grant: Rom 12:16, 2Ch 30:12, Jer 32:39, Eze 11:19, Act 4:32, 1Co 1:10, 2Co 13:11, Phi 1:27, Phi 2:2, Phi 3:16, Phi 4:2, 1Pe 3:8
according to: or, after the example of, Rom 15:3, Eph 5:2, Phi 2:4, Phi 2:5
Reciprocal: Joh 13:15 – given Joh 17:11 – that 1Th 5:23 – God 2Ti 2:22 – peace Heb 6:18 – we might Heb 10:36 – ye have 1Pe 5:10 – the God Rev 2:3 – hast patience
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
5:5
Rom 15:5. Likeminded is similar to the thought in chapter 12:16. The brethren should be united in their care for each other, and to have that unity according to Christ Jesus. Such a mutual consideration for each other will cause them to suppress their personal preference and give their attention to the instructions of the Lord.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Rom 15:5. Now the God of patience and comfort (as in Rom 15:4). He well knows that the Scripture itself is inefficacious without help of the God of the Scriptures (Godet). He is the source of the patience and comfort they afford
Grant you to be of the same mind one toward another, Thus the Apostle returns to the leading thought of the section. To be of the same mind points to harmony of feeling in their intercourse rather than to unanimity of opinion on the disputed points of practice. For such harmony patience and comfort are needed; only the God of patience and comfort can produce these, but He produces them through the Scriptures.
According to Christ Jesus. According to His example (Rom 15:3), but also according to His will as Head of the Church and according to His Spirit as the Life of the Church.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Observe here, 1. How the apostle concludes his foregoing exhortation, with votive supplications, and fervent prayer. The ministers of God must follow the word they deliver with prayer; they must not only wrestle with their people, but they must wrestle with God for and in behalf of their people, if they ever hope to overcome.
Observe, 2. The prayer and supplication itself; and that is, for concord and unity among Christians: That they may, with one mind and one mouth, glorify God: that in their Christian assemblies they may all worship God after the same manner, and not one this way, and another that. Unity among Christians in common conversation, but especially in church-communion, is a very desirable mercy, and much to be prayed for by the ministers of God.
Observe, 3. How the apostle addresses himself in prayer to God for his mercy under a double title, (1.) As a God of patience, The God of patience grant you to be like-minded; intimating what great need there is of patience, in order to maintain love and unity among Christians; and, that God must be applied to in prayer, who is the author of it, to produce and work this grace of patience, in order unto peace and unity among Christians: The God of patience grant you to be like-minded. The unity of the saints greatly depends upon the exercise of patience one towards another; and that they may attain it, he begs the God of patience to give it.
(2.) Our apostle joins with this another title, namely, The God of consolation; wherein he points them to that abundant comfort which would result to themselves from such a blessed unity, continued and maintained by the mutual exercise of patience and forbearance one towards another: The God of patience and consolation grant you to be like-minded one towards another.
Observe, 4. The pattern and example which he lays before them, to excite and quicken them to this duty, namely, the example of Christ himself: According to Christ Jesus, that is, according to the example of Christ Jesus; as if the apostle had said, “Let us consider how the Lord Jesus bears with us, how many thousand infirmities and failings doth he find in the best of us, yet is he pleased to maintain communion with us; and shall not we after his example do the like, that thereby God may be eminently glorified by us?”
Observe, 5. How God is called the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
1. As he begat him by an eternal and ineffable generation.
2. As he was man, so he created him, Luk 1:35.
3. As Mediator, so he appointed him to, and qualified him for, that office.
And eternally magnified be omnipotent love, that the comfort of this compellation of our Lord Jesus Christ, so he is in him our Father also, our merciful, our gracious, and loving Father. May we ever demean ourselves towards him as dutiful and obedient children!
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Rom 15:5-7. Now the God of patience and consolation From whom all these gracious and seasonable provisions proceed; grant you to be like- minded one toward another That is, to be united in peace and love; according to Christ Jesus His doctrine, command, and example, and for his honour and glory. Or, as may be properly rendered, to have the same disposition toward one another; the verb , signifying to care for, as well as to think, Php 2:2 : a disposition, therefore, to live in peace with one another, and to bear one anothers weaknesses, according to Christs precept and example, is here prayed for on behalf of the Romans. Having in the preceding verse mentioned the patience and consolation of the Scripture, the apostle here calls God the God of patience and consolation, to show that the patience and consolation of the saints proceeded from him. In like manner, having in Rom 15:12 said, In him the Gentiles shall hope, he calls God, Rom 15:13, the God of hope, to show that the hope which the Gentiles entertained of salvation, proceeded from him. So also Rom 15:33, the God of peace, and elsewhere, the God of glory, the God of order, &c. That ye Both Jews and Gentiles; believing with one mind And confessing with one mouth, or with united hearts and voices, may glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who hath sent his beloved Son into the world, to unite our hearts in love to each other, and in gratitude to him for his unspeakable love to us. Wherefore receive ye one another Weak and strong, into communion with mutual love, without despising or judging one another; as Christ also received us Whether Jews or Gentiles, to be members of his body the church, and joint heirs with him of eternal felicity; to the glory of God Namely, of his truth to the Jews and mercy to the Gentiles.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Vv. 5. By the double description of God as the God of patience and of consolation, He is characterized as the true source of these two graces which are communicated to us through the channel of the Scriptures. To get them we must therefore go not only to the Scriptures, but to Himself.
There is a close relation in a church between the consolation and the union of its members. When all are inwardly consoled from above, the way is paved for communion of hearts, all together aspiring vehemently after the same supreme good. It is this common impulse which is expressed by Paul’s term ( ). He thus returns to the principal idea of the passage, which he had left for an instant to speak of the Scriptures.
On the difference between Christ Jesus and Jesus Christ, see at Rom 1:1.
Fuente: Godet Commentary (Luke, John, Romans and 1 Corinthians)
Now the God of patience and of comfort grant you to be of the same mind one with another according to Christ Jesus [I cite the Scripture as written for the instruction of the unborn church, for all Scripture, as it outlines what Christ would do sacrificially, also establishes what we should do as imitators of him. It also affords us, in our perusal of it, patience and hope in the doing, for God, the original source back of all Scripture, will not fail in administering aid and comfort to you in your effort toward that spirit of unity and concord which is according to Christ; i. e., according to his desire, will, commandment and example]:
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
Verse 5
According to Christ Jesus; in accordance with the Spirit manifested by him.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
15:5 {4} Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus:
(4) We must take an example of patience from God: that both the weak and the strong, serving God with a mutual consent, may bring one another to God, as Christ also received us to himself, although we were ever so unworthy.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Endurance and encouragement come to us through the Scriptures, but they are gifts from God. Paul wished that all his readers, the strong and the weak, would appropriate these gifts and apply them in their interpersonal relationships. [Note: See Cranfield, 2:736, for helpful comments on Paul’s prayerful wishes.] The result would be unity in the church.
"The centripetal magnetism of the Lord can effectively counter the centrifugal force of individual judgment and opinion." [Note: Harrison, p. 153.]