ROMANS 16:1\u201327<\/b><\/p>\n
I urge you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them<\/i><\/p>\n
(Romans 16:17)<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Paul wrote 15 verses of greetings to various members of the church at Rome, people he has known in the past. This catalogue of people is not only an interesting picture of life in the early church, it also serves to illustrate the unity of believers. Paul climaxes the list by calling on them to express their unity by greeting each other \u201cwith a holy kiss,\u201d and states that \u201call the churches of Christ send greetings\u201d (<\/b>v. 16).<\/p>\n
After this marvelous expression of spiritual unity in the body of Christ, he immediately turns to the negative side of the matter, and urges them to put out of the assembly those who reject the apostolic doctrine and thereby destroy unity in the truth.<\/p>\n
Paul does not mean that every time someone protests an action of the church, or disagrees over a point of teaching, he is to be silenced with the accusation that he is being divisive. But Paul does mean that those who cause divisions are those who are attacking the fundamentals of the faith, and that such people must be dealt with.<\/p>\n
He goes on to describe such divisive people. They \u201care not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites.\u201d In other words, they are ambitious. Moreover, \u201cby smooth talk and flattery they deceive the minds of naive people\u201d (v. 18). So, for the protection of the weaker brethren and of new believers, such people must be dealt with.<\/p>\n
Paul reminds them that \u201ceveryone has heard about your obedience, so I am full of joy over you.\u201d At the same time he wants them to realize that trouble does come in the church, and that they have to deal properly with it: \u201cbut I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil\u201d (v. 19). The leaders of the church are shepherds, and they must protect the sheep from wolves.<\/p>\n
CORAM DEO<\/b><\/p>\n
Many believers accept vows to preserve the peace and purity of the church. Unity and peace are often difficult to maintain since people are instinctively critical. Decide before hand that when strife or error occurs in your church that your concern will be the unity and preservation of the church tempered also by the need for purity and truth.<\/p>\n
For further study: Psalm 133; Acts 20:25\u201335; Ephesians 4:1\u20136<\/i><\/p>\n
thursday<\/p>\n
december<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
ROMANS 16:1\u201327 I urge you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them (Romans 16:17). Paul wrote 15 verses of greetings to various members of the church at Rome, people he has known in the … Continue reading “PRESERVING UNITY IN TRUTH”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11075\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biblia.work\/sermons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}