The reason for Romans

Paul’s crucial message to the Gentiles on God’s purpose for the Jews

The Apostle Paul, in his long letter to the Roman Christians, declared: “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.” (Romans 1.16 & 17) Wherever he went on his great missionary journeys, his first port of call was always the synagogue, which actually followed the pattern set by his Master.

The church in Britain seems, as a whole, to have lost its sharp focus on mission. Where is the emphasis on evangelism that was once such an integral part of British evangelicalism? One thing seems clear to me: that when we take our eyes off the primacy of the gospel, we lose our focus on the place of the Jews in God’s purposes. Along with the revivals of the 18th and 19th centuries came a renewed understanding of our relationship to the Jews. After all, Jesus told the woman at the well that “salvation is from the Jews” (John 4.22).