Lesson 36 (Gospel Doctrine): Romans
 

Lesson 36 notes: Romans

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Excellent, but it sucks to subsume so much in one lesson. That should be two or three lessons at least. You barely were able to scratch the surface.

The ENTIRE book of Romans gets ONE lesson?

They really are trying to squeeze faith and grace in, aren't they?

I think you could do an entire lesson on Chapter One.

Pathetic.

Yep, this is a tough one. I am with you and AA; I would have been nice to spend a few lessons or a few months on Romans.

What do we get one week for the Apocalypse of John?

It gets 2; it moves through everything but the gospels very quickly.

Our lesson on Romans was today. I studied a lot (at least for me, relatively) this week and have enjoyed the study. Here are my comments.

1. IMHO, too many Mormons seem to want to write Romans off as..."Romans were hung up on the law and works, especially circumcision, and Paul was talking to them. The theology Paul preaches is incomplete and not worthy to discuss on its own."

2. Thanks Pelagius for the not on the word "shame" in Rom 1:16 meaning not "embarassed" but "let down or have hope/expecation disappointed". This makes sense and it is repeated and provides better clarity in each case 1:16, 5:5, 6:21, 9:33, 10:11

3. The way Paul uses the words strong/strength and weak/weakness and relating to 2 Cor 12:9 I mentioned last week is becoming clear to me that he means God or God's power when he uses word strength and means man's mortality when he uses weak/weakness. This further makes me wonder if Ether 12:27 is a misguided interpretation of 2 Cor 12:9.

4. Like Pelagius, I saw the similarity between Nephi and Paul, especially last half of Romans 7 with Nephi's psalm and 2 Ne 9.

5. Romans reinforces the New Testament Jesus teachings of grace towards sinners and evil of judging sinners. I really don't think we get it as Mormons.

6. Paul uses the polemic technique all through Romans of throwing out the questions he's being threatened with by his critics. It's so odd to me that we as Mormons play the perfect role of what Paul is slamming against. People that slam Evangelicals or others who believe in easy grace by saying "well if we have grace, let's all just sin all we want!"

Paul does it THREE times

3:8,9
6:1,2
6:15

and the answer in 6:17,18 on why works are still vital

7. Interesting note that Christ and God seem to be interchanged between KJV and NRSV. I always assume God = Christ when I read scripture, but I don't know that most LDS do this.

8. Interesting corollary between Romans 11 and Jacob 5

9. Nice explanation of Matt 22:37-40 in Romans 13

10. I like the common sense counsel on what to consider a commandment when it comes to the drinking Coke kind of commandments in chapter 14.

11. Nice mix of males and females he counts as church leadership in chapter 16.

12. Paul does a great job of a full, complete gospel analysis of the fall, the Law, the need for Savior, the Savior and atonement, and how we partake of the atonement. Maybe due to KJV comprehension difficulty or maybe to avoid similarities with Christians, we ignore it in favor of BOM or other sources to teach exact same doctrines.

13. Justification is defined fairly extensively. Sanctification is also introduced. I don't know about you, but I was taught both of these are very works-centered concepts. That teaching would put you in directly and diametrically opposed to Paul, IMHO.

14. Thanks to SIEQ for helping me think about this idea that there are conflicting doctrines in scripture (and GC for that matter) and maybe none of them are wrong and maybe none of them are exclusively right. The gospel has to be looked at in totality. But to point #1, you can't just blow Romans off completely.

Lots of interesting points Jay. I think number (1) is important. I think this statement is generally true. I think there is a tendency to believe that we are already know what the scriptures say. Let the text speak to you; try to encounter it from a new direction. I think, generally speaking, a lot of people read Romans in a reactionary mode or defensive mode. That locks in a certain view and isn't necessary. It is such a beautiful epistle.

I think that is a wonderful thing about early Christianity: the prominence of woman. Regardless of how a person reads those specific verses, it does underscore their prominence and importance to the early Christian movement. Also for those that are intrigued by the Junia issue (female and an apostle issue), see Kevin Barney's discussion of Ben Witherington's Bible Review article:

http://www.bycommonconsent.com/2007/06/elder-joanna/

I'd be cautious about labeling any scripture a misguided interpretation of another. It is altogether possible that conflicting doctrine has managed to creep its way into scripture (since all guarantees of perfection are off once perfection gets placed into the hands of mortals), but it is probably safer to assume that your own interpretation of the scriptures is off before concluding that the scriptures themselves are in conflict.

Try looking at Ether another way, and see if another interpretation doesn't make more sense in the light of what you know about Corinthians. It might be a good idea to do this in another thread.