Romans 16:1-16 ~ Welcome to our Crazy Family ~ Carl Crouse

I heard a story at the elders meeting this past week from Hope A.C. Church in Chicago.  The question was how the Pastor of the church led the congregation from a struggling group of 30 people to several hundred people excited about ministry.  One day the pastor found gang members tagging the side of the building.  A large man with an imposing presence, he confronted them ~  “What are you doing?” As they stammered out a non-answer, the pastor said, “My favorite color is red.”  Hesitantly they gave him a red spray paint can.  He joined them defacing the building.  Then they asked him who he was ~ he told them he was the pastor of the church.   This made no sense!  And he challenged them to show up the following Sunday.  “We don’t do church” they responded.  “I’ll tell you what,” the pastor said, “You come to church one time and tell me that afterwards.”  Six of them showed up that Sunday.  Today, I’m not sure how many years later, two of those six are in youth leadership and a couple are worship leaders.  And the church has it’s finger on the pulse of the community.

Welcome to the crazy family called the church.  

Romans 16 is one of those scriptures that is less likely to be preached on unless you go through the entire book…~ It’s a list of names.  At first glance a yawner.  Goodness, if I had only one chapter to pick, I’d probably choose something like Romans 5. J At a glance, a great verse like Rom. 5:1 is much meatier than Rom. 16:6 ~ “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” vs. “Greet Mary, who worked very hard for you.”  Yet this list is the capstone of Romans and tells us something important. 

Many people want to see Romans as an encyclopedia of Christian teaching…, but this amazing book of God’s word is written to encourage the people to grow in their thinking of who is acceptable to God.  Paul wrote the book with a purpose.  By having this list of 27 names at the end of the book + a few unnamed people, mostly members of the community of faith in Rome, it is a reminder that Paul is writing to real people.  They are ordinary people with strengths and weaknesses, different from each other, bound together by Christ.  It’s a crazy list of people.   Welcome to our crazy family!  Any of you have relatives you are ashamed of?  Sally has crazier relatives than me!... Believe it ore not, I am not embarrassed by any of you! 

The truth of Jesus Christ is to be lived out by ordinary people in the everyday world. Christianity is not only a good idea ~ it is a way of life.  I explain to people all the time we are simple people at SACC doing our best to be faithful to God as we search for peace.  Romans 16 is a list of a people that are thrown together in a community because Jesus Christ loves them and died for them.  Listen to Rom. 3:9: “What shall we conclude then?  Are we any better?  Not at all!  We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin.  As it is written, ‘There is no one righteous…all have turned away…” That kind of talk enables a pastor in Chicago tell a group of gang members his favorite color is red and join them in tagging his own church.  I’m just a sinner saved by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and I declare to the world that I am equally unworthy of God’s grace as you!  We are called to live out our faith in a stress filled confusing uncertain world and bring a bit of the sanity of Christ to people so he can get hold of them and change them completely through his blood and resurrection! 

Welcome to our Crazy family.  Sally and I started watching “The Voice” a few weeks ago.  We have been catching up on this season.  A few nights ago one of the contestants made an intriguing statement as he prepared for the nights competition: “If I’m outsang, I’m outsang [don’t think that’s a word, but I like it], but nobody is going to work as hard as me.”  That kind of attitude is what I am thinking about SACC ~ there may be more skilled people out there, better preachers, better programs, more polished gatherings, cutting edge in every area, and that’s good and awesome, but nobody is going to outdo us in looking to God, doing our best, and inviting God to make up the difference in our many shortcomings.  “If I am outsang I am outsang,”  I want people here that want to be here and belong here and can accept that we are just a bunch of imperfect people.  BUT praise the Lord we serve a perfect God!               

Welcome to our crazy family.  My favorite color is red. 

Paul had never been to Rome.  He writes this letter to a church he’s never seen.  Or had he?  He never saw the church in Rome, but he knew all these people and if the church is people then he was acquainted with the church. Rom. 16 is an amazing list of people he knows even though he’s never been there.  A few years later after he writes this letter he goes to Rome.  But he goes as a prisoner.  That’s a story for another time ~ it’s how the book of Acts ends….

Let’s walk through this list of names:

* Phoebe is first.  READ Rom. 16:1-2.  She is sent by Paul to deliver this letter to Rome.  A woman. Paul trusted and commended a woman, incredibly amazing for the culture of the time.  I’m amazed by the story of my grandmother, Ethyl Lobb, when she was young in the 1920s she delivered the payroll to the miners up the Frazier Valley!  A woman! A Church met in Phoebe’s home.  The church must be ready to use and welcome unexpected people.  We must think outside the box and let God use who God wants because God is amazing.  We must commend to others the surprising people God chooses to use in unexpected ways.  The message of Romans that nobody is worthy, but God can use anybody he chooses, is lived out in Rom. 16, even a woman named Phoebe in a very surprising role ~ may the same surprising pattern be lived out in Sumas!  A gang member becomes a youth leader in an Advent Christian Church in Chicago!  God is amazing and uses unworthy people!  That’s all he has to work with because nobody is worthy! 

 [Here is a the church that God has to work with {box of assorted scrap wood}  Jim Jeffries, if I were to say to you take this box and build me one of your beautiful planters with it, you could not do it.  But God can.  He can build a church out of scrap wood, which is you and me.]  Nobody is worthy we are told in Romans, yet God uses anybody he chooses. Maybe it is you that is resisting God’s calling because you don’t think you are good enough….

The next few names are people who are partners in ministry to Paul.  If these were the only names on Paul’s list we might conclude God is selective in who he uses because these are proven people.  All it really means is that people mature in faith and God uses seasoned Christians alongside new Christians:

* Priscilla (Prisca) and Aquila.  READ Rom. 16:3-5a.  This couple pops up in several other books of the N.T.  Originally from Rome, they appear in Corinth and Ephesus, and then move back to Rome. The Church of Rome met in their house.  This was a dedicated couple to the faith.  Priscilla’s name comes before Aquila’s.  The woman before the man ~ is it because she is more prominent?  What a crazy church family.

* Epaenetus was Paul’s first convert in Asia Minor (which is modern-day Turkey).  READ Rom. 16:5b.  Evidently he later moved to Rome.

* Mary was a hard-working Christian woman.  Rom. 16:6 

*Andronicus and Junia (READ Rom. 16:7)) are either a brother and sister or a husband and wife missionary team. Paul calls them relatives probably because they are Jewish. They came to Christ before he did. Why Paul has a need to include that detail is not certain, but it is a way of letting the Romans know he is not promoting himself as the be all end all authority on what it means to follow Christ, but they can trust others as well to teach them and lead them. 

The next four names in Rom. 16:8-10 are in a very different category of people: Ampliatus, Urbanus, Stachys and Apelles.  Now we are getting to more surprising people serving Christ in Rome alongside the seasoned workers.  Paul says he loves one, a fellow worker, a dear friend and approved by Christ.  You know what these four have in common?  In the culture of the day, these are names of slaves.  What a crazy family!  Well known missionaries of the day, prominent mature Christians, are in the church family alongside slaves. It gets crazier.

The next three names in Rom. 16:10-11 have connection to the imperial household in Rome: Aristobulus, Herodion, Narcissus. Royal names.  You recognize Herod in the name Herodian. Nowadays we name people for prominent people we appreciate: I bet Michelle is common for girls right now ~ in those days names were reserved for classes of people.  

Proven servants of Christ alongside slaves alongside Royalty are all in the Church of Rome!  Nobody is worthy.  God creates an amazing crazy church out of scrap wood! 

Most commentators think Tryphaena and Tryphosa in Rom. 16:12 were sisters, maybe twins. Their names mean “dainty” or “delicate,” ~ Paul calls them hardworkers.  Likely these sisters came from the spoiled aristocratic class. People who you would expect to be pampered are changed completely by their faith in the Lord. 

Persis in v. 12 means “woman of Persia.”  A crazy church with people from far off lands. 

Rufus in Rom. 16:13 is fascinating READ. He is likely the celebrity of the church.  Mark in the gospel of Mark mentions Simon of Cyrene who carried Jesus’ cross, had two sons, Alexander and Rufus (Mark 15:21). Since Mark’s gospel seems to have been written to Rome, it is possible that this Rufus is Simon’s son, the man who carried the cross of Christ.  Could you imagine such a man, the son of the cross bearer of Christ, being in the church?

Romans 16:14 is a group of men.  Maybe a men’s small group.  Not much known about them or why they are in a single list.  Rom. 16:15 another people grouped together.  Almost sounds like another house church the way it ends, “and all the saints with them.” 

Rom. 16 shows the breadth of the diverse people drawn to the Christian message. The church at Rome included the rich and the poor, new Christians and those that have been walking in Christ for years, slaves and free, Jews and Gentiles, forgotten house churches and members of the imperial household.

Welcome to our crazy church family ~ God has taken a box of mismatched scrapwood, oak and fir, finished and raw, used and unused, and transforms us by his spirit into a God honoring community of faith serving the Lord Jesus Christ.  All ages, backgrounds are here.  People from large cities, small towns.  We are living examples that no-one is worthy of Christ, we are all equally unequal no matter our education level, privileges, disadvantages… People from the palace alongside slaves, all in Christ, the dainty in nature overcome and contribute, women who society says are second class are commended in the church for their hard work and leadership.  Welcome to our crazy and wonderful church family, with the head of the family Jesus Christ, each contributing according to gifts, calling, abilities, personality, and opportunity.  No need for us to all be the same, we simply need to look to Christ.  Jesus can take a box of scrap wood and create a beautiful church family.  Amen.  

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