EPISODE 107 ROMANS CHAPTER 15 "Faithful are the wounds of a friend"

Welcome to Share the Word. As we dive into chapter 15, Paul reminds us that every believer has the responsibility to one another. And as we look deeper into the chapter, pay close attention when the subject of admonishment pops in. Let's get started. Romans chapter 15. Faithful are the wounds of a friend.

When I was a kid, the first level of school you attended was often called grammar school in the U.S. anyway. That was grades 1 through 6. I'm guessing that's because one of the most important things they wanted us to know by the time we completed the sixth grade was the basic rules of grammar. Grammar is the set of rules that governs how words are used in a language, so, you know, nouns and pronouns, verbs and adverbs, adjectives, and so on, how these things are properly used in a sentence. As you get deeper into the fascinating world of grammar, you learn that there are also subsets of each of these word categories. So let's test your mastery of English grammar.

If I ask you to name the only two reciprocal pronouns in the English language, can you do it? Have your answer locked in? In English, the only two reciprocal pronouns are each other and one another. These are used when two or more people or things are acting in the same way towards each other. Margie mentioned a couple episodes ago how many times the term one another comes up in this practical How Should Christians Live section of Romans. I want to get back to that today.

One of the top three people who've influenced my thinking as a Christian is a teacher and writer by the name of Gene Getz. Getz taught for many years at Dallas Theological Seminary, and he taught in the practical theology department. That means he taught young men preparing for the ministry how to actually lead and build churches, the nuts and bolts of it. What I appreciated about Getz is he spent a lot of time studying the New Testament inductively, with questions in mind like, What really is a healthy church according to the New Testament writers? What should be the obligations of the members? And what would make a church a dynamic witness in its community?

It was while he was studying those kinds of things, he says, he kept coming across this term, one another. It was jumping off the pages of Scripture at him. First, he noticed how many times Jesus stressed that his followers needed to love one another. Then he noticed that that overarching command of Jesus seemed to get broken down into derivatives, kind of like tributaries, as the apostles, for the benefit of the early Christians in the churches they founded, applied what it means to love one another in actual behavioral terms. Getz did a lot of study on this theme, even wrote a book on the subject titled Building Up One Another, and frequently lectured on it in his classes. Then something happened that he didn't anticipate, which changed his life.

Several of his graduate-level students challenged him to take his discoveries about these one another commandments in the New Testament out of a classroom and actually plant a new church, teaching and stressing them at the local church level. But he was an academic, a teacher for 20 years. He only taught others what churches should do. He didn't see himself as a pastor or a church planter. Nevertheless, it was a challenge, he said, that stuck in his mind. He couldn't ignore it.

He felt an inescapable desire to try that, and he and some of his students started Fellowship Bible Church in Dallas, Texas, built on the one another principles in the New Testament. It grew rapidly as people in the community saw a level of connectedness between members that was unusual. And as that local church grew, Dr. Getz actually resigned his seminary teaching position and became its full-time pastor. And it continued to grow and actually reproduced more than 15 more congregations in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. I read Getz's little book, Building Up One Another, in a larger volume called Sharpening the Focus of the Church when I was a young pastor.

He opened my eyes to the fact that it's how well believers understand and, more importantly, implement the New Testament's one another principles that will largely determine how healthy a local church will be, both internally, as in how much unity and love the members experience, but also externally, as in whether it will draw people from the surrounding community who are looking for authentic Christianity. The Christian fellowship, the local church, that's God's unique idea of a social organization in which His people join together to build each other up and influence their community with the gospel. When the early Christian church sprang onto the scene in the first century, it was unlike anything else in that world. The members' interconnectedness and the nurturing atmosphere drew people to it like a magnet.

But that's not something that just happened spontaneously, because not all of the early churches were successful. It's the result of obedience to a bunch of specific one another commands written down in the New Testament writings. Margie discussed a couple of them from chapter 12, if you remember, being devoted to one another and honoring one another. So let's turn our attention to another couple more that show up here in Romans chapter 15. One of the biggest challenges the early churches faced was because of how culturally diverse the major cities of the empire were, the cities where these first churches began. This was certainly the case in Rome, which was a microcosm of the empire.

You could find people there from every nationality with very diverse cultural backgrounds and from every economic class. When the gospel came to Rome, people embraced it across that spectrum. People who normally had little to nothing to do with each other in this world suddenly became connected because of their mutual faith in Jesus. But could they ever become truly a fellowship? Could they ever meld into a spiritual family? In chapter 15, at verses 5 to 7, we find this very important instruction.

May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you a spirit of unity among yourselves as you follow Christ. Accept one another, then, just as Christ has accepted you in order to bring praise to God. Accept one another. One day, when I realized who Jesus was and what he had done for me at the cross, and I opened my heart to him, invited him to come into my life, he saved me from the consequences of my sin. He became my Savior, and I put my confidence in him as my leader. I hope by now you've made that same life-changing decision.

So tell me, when we did that, responded in faith to the message of the gospel, on what basis did God accept us? Did it have anything to do with how educated we were? Did it have anything to do with how well off financially we were? Did it have anything to do with what racial or ethnic background we were from? No, no, and no. The Bible teaches that it's not because of anything about us or in us.

In fact, regardless of who in the world we are, based simply on our faith response to what God offers us in Christ, we are accepted into God's family. So, do you see what Paul was writing to the early Christians when he says, Accept one another just as, that is, in the very same way as, Christ has accepted you. Real people were coming into this new community called the Christian Church. They were very different. They came with baggage. But God says, You must leave all that stuff behind now because in my family, we're going to accept one another totally apart from any temporal distinctions, any human differences.

God's intention was that the Christian community be very different, be a place where the distinctions that normally divided people simply were put aside, where Jewish believers and Gentiles, rich people and poor people and even slaves, light-skinned people and dark-skinned people, educated people, cultured people, common people, all could come together in one spiritual family, and that a very divided world looking on would marvel at that. Can you see how important this still is, especially the more multicultural and economically diverse the place you live is? A couple thousand years have elapsed, but the problems of prejudice and racism, the things that divide people, they still are very much with us. There are certainly economic distinctions today, classes, racial barriers still separating people.

Our primary racial divide in America isn't between Jews and Gentiles, as in the earliest churches. It's between people of color and whites. After graduate school, I became a pastor of a church in a small town in western Pennsylvania. One of the first serious problems I ran into was that a black guy in our church in his mid-twenties and a white girl about the same age started dating seriously. He was a great guy. In fact, he was one of the younger men I saw so much potential in, I invited him into a discipleship group with me so we could work on leadership skills and growing in our faith together.

His girlfriend was also a very serious Christian, and she was the daughter of one of the leaders of the church. When, after a year or so, they came and told me they wanted to get married and asked would I preside at the ceremony, I said, Of course. I'd be honored to do that. But you know, even in Pennsylvania at that time, there was unfortunately some serious blowback against that. I got letters in my file to this day I kept because they were so amazing to me. And that situation caused me to go back to the Scripture to understand what God says about the importance of accepting people regardless of differences.

What I learned is summarized very well here in Romans 15, verses 5, 6, and 7, and that is that there is no basis in the Bible to believe any race is superior to anybody else. I guess maybe if you're an evolutionist, the idea of superiority of one kind of person over another makes sense. But the Bible is clear that all human beings are created in God's image. In Colossians chapter 3, verses 11 through 13, Paul writes on this exact point. I'm quoting now: We are renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created us. And so this renewal means there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but where Christ is all and in all.

Sythians were like the worst people in the world at that time, by the way. Applying that truth to our time and situation, the New Testament teaching is that for Christians in our church fellowships, whether we're black or brown or white, whether we're cultured or educated or just plain folks, whether we're from the upper class, middle class, or lower class, if we're believers, we are equally connected to Christ. And since we are spiritual equals, we must accept one another just as Christ has accepted us, because that brings glory to God. Even though I live in an area now that still has a lot of cultural and racial divides hanging on, I'm glad the local church that I belong to and participate in is a big and clear exception where people feel welcome whoever they are. They're accepted without distinctions so common in the rest of the world. You know what?

That's the way it should be in 100% of the local bodies that call themselves a Christian church. Accept one another. I have a few minutes more, so let me point out another important one another concept that comes up here in Romans 15, and this one's at verse 14, where Paul writes, I myself am convinced that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with knowledge, and capable of admonishing one another. Admonishing one another. What's that? Admonish is probably not a word in your daily vocabulary.

The most well-known place it's used in the New Testament is probably Ephesians 6:4, where it says, Fathers, don't provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Admonition is the noun form. Admonish is the Greek, speaking of grammar. I really miss the days when my children were small. But if you had secretly recorded my interactions with them when they were, what you'd find is that an awful lot of my communication with them was admonition. Lydia, don't drink that bath water.

It's full of dirt and germs. We're trying to wash off your body. Natalie, no, no, no, you can't feed baby Sam nacho chips. He'll choke on those things. Sound familiar, parents? When you have a child in your care, it seems like every time you turn around, you're having to admonish them about something.

The word used here in 15:14, translated admonish, means to bring something to the front of someone's mind, to confront them with something in order to correct or protect them. Sometimes this word is translated in other versions warn or counsel, but it's the same idea. To admonish means to confront someone in order to protect them from danger or turn them away from wrong. It's been a long time since some of us were little. I bet you haven't been tempted to gulp down any bath water recently, but no offense, you probably have done some things just about as stupid in your adult years and even more dangerous. I know I have.

I'm talking about making bad decisions, developing bad attitudes, getting into wrong relationships, and, you know, getting off on the wrong track from where God wants us to be. So the question is, who admonishes us now? It's a pastor's job, of course. The Apostle Paul wrote in Colossians chapter 1, verse 28, We proclaim Christ, admonishing and teaching every man with all wisdom so that we may present every man complete in Christ. So yes, in a general sense, pastors and teachers in a local church should admonish members as part of their public ministry, even private ministry. But of course the problem is, as a church grows and more and more people become part of the fellowship, how well can any leader know, much less admonish effectively, every individual church member?

He can't. But you know who can? What did verse 14 say? I'm convinced, brothers, that you yourselves, you yourselves, are full of goodness, filled with knowledge and capable of admonishing one another. Us? Yeah, us.

You see, as a good church develops and relationships deepen, who better to keep each other on the right track than our Christian friends? That's who's most likely to know what's going on in our lives, right? At any age, as children of God, we still need admonition. No one can be a more effective admonisher than a close Christian friend. And listen, there's no more valuable service a Christian friend can render to another than to be willing to admonish them when it's needed. And keeping in mind this instruction is mutual, reciprocal, we should not only be willing to admonish others, we should be open to receiving it as well, whoever we are.

So how do you react when one of your Christian friends does something you know is wrong, or when you learn that they are contemplating doing something wrong? I'm not talking about opinions now. We covered that in chapter 14. I'm talking about wrong. What do you do? I think honestly, too many of us don't do anything.

Hey, it's their life, right? Wrong. If they're a Christian, they belong to the Lord. Hey, it's none of my business, really. Oh, wrong. In the body of Christ, we are a family.

If our brother or sister is heading for trouble and we're aware of it, it's our business. What kind of love watches a friend heading for trouble and stands idly by to watch? Proverbs 27, verses 5 and 6 say, Better is an open rebuke than hidden love. Faithful are the wounds of a friend. Radical individualism so prized in our society today is what leads people to say, It's their life. It's really none of my business.

That's just another example of where our culture is at odds with God's Word. Remember what we heard in Galatians chapter 6? Brothers, if someone is overtaken in sin, you who are spiritual, restore them. There are, however, as these verses suggest, some qualifications for admonishing effectively. Paul wrote, I'm convinced, brothers, that you are full of goodness and filled with knowledge and so able to admonish one another. Someone capable of admonishing another person well should be full of goodness.

What do you think he meant by that? Well, we have our own act together reasonably, I think he meant. No Christian is perfect, but a capable admonisher is someone the other person would take seriously, someone they would respect. Jesus said it this way in Matthew 7, Don't try and remove splinters from your brother's eye if you have a beam in your own eye. If you try and admonish one of your friends while they are aware of glaring problems in your own life that you're not dealing with, probably will not go very well. But we don't have to be perfect to be an admonisher, or none of us could do it.

We just need to be someone they will take seriously, someone the other person respects. Additionally, he says that what makes someone competent to admonish is their knowledge. Admonition must never be based on just opinions, but what God specifically revealed about the situation. Admonition is an attempt to turn somebody around who is heading for trouble, who is thinking about engaging in or breaking God's rules. And that requires that we understand what God actually says about the issue, that we are knowledgeable enough to confront them with what God says, not our opinions, but what God says. You don't have to be a Bible scholar, but you do need to be sure that what you're going to bring to their attention is something God's Word speaks clearly about.

There's a third thing that we should keep in mind when we try and admonish another person. It's not specifically referred to in this verse, but it is in many others where this topic comes up, and it has to do with the manner in which we go about it. It needs to be in the spirit of humility and love, gentleness. As Galatians 6:1 says, If someone is overtaken in a fault, you who are spiritual, restore that one in a spirit of gentleness. This is pretty crucial. They've got to clearly sense you're coming to them motivated by a heart of love.

You're not coming down on them. If not, it will come across as just criticism and wrong judgment. Criticism is like a dull axe that cuts and bruises. Admonition is like a scalpel, clean and precise. Its intent is to remove a problem and bring about healing. So, a capable admonisher is a serious Christian who, when he sees a friend heading for trouble or is already in trouble, is willing to confront them gently out of a genuine concern.

Clearly and knowledgeably speaking to the problem, he brings what God has to say to his erring brother or sister's attention with the goal of turning them back to God's ways. Have you ever been effectively admonished? I have. It's powerful. Have you ever given someone in your life you respect a permission to intervene in your life this way if they feel the need to? That's wise.

For a Christian church fellowship to be the kind of fellowship God desires, we need this kind of input from one another. I remember years ago hearing the TV preacher Jim Bakker interviewed after his humbling downfall. He went to prison, actually. You remember Jim and Tammy Faye? He spent time in prison for financial crimes while heading a Christian ministry, not one that I was a fan of, but that's beside the point. What struck me in the interview was when Bakker said, I wish during those years when I was making one bad decision after another, someone around me had said, Hold on, Jim.

What in the world are you doing? But no one did. There was nobody around him who would admonish him, no one who had the courage and the love to do it. And what a black eye the name of Christ took, Christianity in general took, that could have been avoided had Jim Bakker only had Christian friends who obeyed God's word on this important point. I know what you're probably thinking, Wow, Paul, that would be really hard to do. Yes, it does take some holy boldness.

But as Gene Getz wrote in Building Up One Another, and think about this, there is no greater sign of love than to be willing to risk rejection or even a broken relationship with someone in the interest of their higher good. And when admonition comes from a real friend and is based on the truth of God's Word, the person you are confronting will usually sense the risk you're taking. And although they may have difficulty acknowledging it immediately, down deep they'll know you're right. One day they will doubtless thank you for your love and your concern, because faithful are the wounds of a friend. This is Paul for Share the Word. Thanks, Paul.

It was very clear that the Apostle Paul cared deeply for all those he wrote to. He had compassion for them, and he loved them deeply. But he understood the necessity of admonishing. And when he speaks of admonishing someone, he's very clear that it should be done out of love. Have you been focused on the one another? As our faith strengthens, we see the benefit of sacrificing our own desires to live in harmony with others.

From all of us at Share the Word, our blessings and prayers go out to all of you.