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Meditating in the field
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Written approximately between the late 55 and 57AD, the book of Romans is considered one of Paul’s most complete epistles in its doctrinal discussion. At the time of writing this epistle, the Christian community in Rome were confronted by external persecution from the Roman emperors and internal discords between Jewish and non-Jewish Christians. Paul was therefore eager to visit and strengthen them (Romans 1: 13-15).
Rome at Paul’s time was a major city and political center of 1 million inhabitants, where emperors and the senate resided. Its inhabitants consisted of slaves, freedmen, official Roman citizens, as well as military and political nobilities. The population was mostly polytheistic. Influenced by Greek mythology, they worshipped gods, demigods, as well as Roman emperors. Until the appearance of Judaism and Christianity, the authority tolerated most religions so long as the emperors were included in people’s worship. By 40 AD, Christianity had become a major presence in Rome. Although it was unclear how the churches first started in Roman, many believed that it began with the Jews who visited Jerusalem and brought back the gospel. Some even believed that the gospel was preached to Rome by the Jews as early as during the Pentecost.
The Christians at the time were not collected into a single congregation. They were small groups of Christ-followers that gathered in house churches to worship, such as exemplified by the mentioning of Priscilla and Aquila (Romans 16:3-5). It was also believed that the early church was mostly led by Jewish Christians. However, the Jews were banished from Rome between 49AD-54AD under the rule of Roman Emperor Claudius (1 Aug 10 BC-13 Oct 54 AD). For five years, during the banishment of Jewish Christians, non-Jewish Christians took over the church’s leadership. By the time Jewish Christians were allowed back to Rome, they found the church a different one from the one they left behind. As a result, the two groups conflicted as Jewish Christians struggled to incorporate Old Testament law into their daily Christian living, such as the practice of circumcision. Paul therefore spent a great portion of the epistle expounding on the relationship between the Jews and the non-Jews (Romans 9: 1-5, 30-32; 11: 11-16), as well as between being justified by faith and by the Mosaic law (Romans 3:22; 4: 6-12; 5: 1).
In addition to internal conflicts, Christians of Pauls’ time also confronted great persecution. Paul wrote the book of Romans during the early reigns of Emperor Nero (Dec 15, 37AD-June 9, 68AD). Despite his short reign of 14 years (54-68AD), Nero was infamous for oppressing Christians that first started with the Great Fire of Rome (18-23 July of 64AD). The fire destroyed two thirds of Rome. Many believed Nero was the masterminder who set Rome on fire in order to build a new city named after himself. However, responding to mounting political pressure, he made Christians the scapegoat. As punishment, Christians were set on fire daily as human torches to lit up Nero’s gardens. During gladiator matches, Christians were fed to lions. The oppression of Christians continued and worsened well into the reign of Emperor Diocletian (303-311AD), lasting altogether 250 years after Jesus’s death and resurrection. Christians were subject to mockery, crucifixion, decapitation, extreme torture, eaten by wild beasts at amphitheatre, and burned at the stake. John was banished to the island of Patmos, Paul was decapitated in Rome, and Peter was crucified upside down. It is then of no wonder that Paul likened Christians’ experience to that of putting on a highly theatrical entertainment, “For it seems to me that God has put us apostles on display at the end of the procession, like men condemned to die in the arena. We have been made a spectacle to the whole universe, to angels as well as to men” (1 Corinthians 4: 9 and 10).
It was in these extremely inhuman circumstances, Paul repeatedly reassured the Christians in Rome, “I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us” (Romans 8: 18). Despite Jesus’s physical absence, Paul comforted the believers, “…the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express (Romans 8: 26). In spite of their daily hardships, Paul pinpointed that sufferings could work for rather than against those who are faithful to God, “[a]nd we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (8: 28). Paul finally ended his exhortation with a series of rhetorical questions to profess his love for Christ, “[w]ho shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?.... No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us” (Romans 8: 35 and 37).
2,000 years after the ascension of Jesus, 5 years after the outbreak of a global pandemic, the world rapidly changes more than ever. Are we still able to boldly and confidently assert, who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Social media? Shifting paradigms? Information explosion? Artificial Intelligence? Financial adversity/prosperity? Health issues? Relationships? Loved ones? Wars and rumors of war?
References
http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/rome.htm
https://ahnsahnghong.com/en/church-of-god/persecution-in-the-roman-empire/
https://earlychurchhistory.org/politics/tacitus-on-christians/
https://www.learnreligions.com/the-early-church-at-rome-363409
