Grace Comes From Outside
Reflections on Romans, Grace, and the Surprising Messenger of the Gospel
The Sunday lectionary this summer is taking us through the highlights of St. Paul's Letter to the Romans. Romans is, in many ways, the heart of the modern Christian understanding of the Gospel. While it is not one of the four canonical Gospels recounting the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, it is Paul's great work of systematic theology. Think of it as the "so what?" of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Now that we have seen who Jesus is and heard what he taught, how then shall we live?
It is a remarkable piece of writing. Even secular scholars have marveled for centuries at Paul's imaginative, profound, and transformative reimagining of his Jewish faith in light of the risen Christ. Much of what Christians believe about sin, grace, salvation, faith, the Church, and the life of discipleship finds its clearest articulation in Romans. It is difficult to overstate its influence.
Yet, while much attention is given to a handful of famous verses, there are two remarkable themes in Romans that often receive far less attention than they deserve. The first is Paul's breathtaking vision of grace. The second is what the very existence of Romans teaches us about the ministry of women in the earliest Church. Let's begin with grace:
Romans, from beginning to end, is an assault on one of humanity's oldest lies—that our worth must be earned.
Many of us carry a quiet conviction that we are lovable only if we are admirable. We believe God will love us if we become holy enough. Our spouses will love us if we become successful enough. Our friends will love us if we become interesting enough. We become strivers—always chasing one more accomplishment, one more promotion, one more achievement, one more spiritual victory—in hopes that we might finally deserve love.
Paul dismantles that entire way of thinking.
"But God proves his love for us in that while we still were sinners Christ died for us" (Romans 5:8).
Notice the order. God does not wait for humanity to become righteous before acting. God's love is not a reward for moral improvement. Grace does not arrive after repentance as payment for good behavior. Rather, grace comes first. God acts first. Christ dies first. Mercy precedes merit.
This is one of Christianity's most revolutionary claims.
Grace is external.
It comes from outside ourselves. We cannot manufacture it, summon it, or deserve it. It arrives as gift.
Grace is unmerited.
Paul insists repeatedly that we are "justified by his grace as a gift" (Romans 3:24), not by our accomplishments, our morality, or our religious performance.
And perhaps most wonderfully, grace is unavoidable.
God is always the first mover. Before we have prayed, God is already listening. Before we have repented, God is already pursuing. Before we have cleaned ourselves up, God has already stepped toward us in Christ.
That is extraordinarily freeing.
The Christian life is not an exhausting attempt to climb our way toward God. It is waking up each morning to discover that God has already come looking for us.
Paul came to liberate slaves and citizens alike from the crushing burden of self-justification. Perhaps he still does.
The second remarkable lesson from Romans is one that surprises many modern readers.
The debates over women exercising authority in the Church often feel ancient and settled. In reality, they are surprisingly modern, particularly within segments of American Protestant Christianity. Much of the worldwide Church has long recognized women in ordained and teaching ministries. The Anglican Communion itself has ordained women to the diaconate, priesthood, and episcopate for decades. But the debate rages in some corners, most recently in the shocking rhetoric and vote to further isolate and silence women in the Southern Baptist Convention just last month.
Curiously, one of the strongest witnesses to settle this debate comes from Romans itself.
At the beginning of chapter 16, Paul introduces the person who carried this extraordinary letter from Corinth to the Christians in Rome: Phoebe.
Paul describes her as "our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church at Cenchreae" (Romans 16:1) and asks the Roman Christians to receive her with honor.
The renowned Anglican bishop and New Testament scholar N. T. Wright reflected on this remarkable moment in an interview while visiting America last month, too:
"I start with two women who are prominent in the New Testament. One is Phoebe. When Paul writes Romans, he gives the letter to an independent businesswoman who lives just east of Corinth, because she's going on a business trip to Rome, and she is going to take the letter. That in itself is a bit shocking to some people. Romans is one of the greatest pieces of writing ever—of letters or anything. It's an extraordinary document. Who are you going to give it to? Well, some senior apostle. Well, no, actually it's Phoebe. She's on this trip. She'll do it. When in the ancient world somebody took a letter to somebody else, especially a group of people, almost certainly—they would be the ones who would read it out. And when people said, 'Excuse me, what did that mean?' they would also be the ones who would explain it. So the high probability is that the first person to do public exposition of Paul's letter to the Romans was a businesswoman from east of Corinth. That blows people's minds."
It certainly should. NT Wright goes on in that interview to highlight the ministry of yet another woman sent by Jesus himself, Mary Magdaline, as the first witness and proclaimer of the resurrected Christ in John’s gospel, to say that this debate is biblically settled.
The very letter so often quoted in debates about authority was most likely first proclaimed and interpreted publicly by a woman entrusted by Paul himself.
Romans continues to surprise us.
Its opening chapter contains one of Scripture's sharpest condemnations of human sinfulness, including sexual immorality—a passage that has often been isolated, overstated, and, sadly, weaponized in modern debates. I fear too many people stop reading there. Yet Paul does not stop there. Indeed, that is precisely the point. Romans refuses to leave anyone standing on moral high ground. By chapter three, everyone is under the same verdict: "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23).
The purpose of Romans is not condemnation. It is grace.
The purpose of exposing our brokenness is to reveal the breathtaking scope of God's mercy.
If we stop reading after chapter one, we miss the Gospel. We miss the relentless love of God pursuing humanity through Christ. We miss Paul's magnificent declaration that nothing "in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 8:39).
This summer, I encourage you to read Romans for yourself.
Read it slowly.
Read it prayerfully.
Read it over several weeks rather than all at once.
You may discover, as generations of Christians before you have, that this extraordinary letter is less about what you must do for God and far more about what God has already done for you.
That is grace.
Pax et Bonum!
Fr. Ben
