Good morning. If you're able, please open up your Bibles to Romans chapter 1. And when you've found it, please stand for the reading of God's Word. We're going to read Paul's greeting, his salutation, his wonderfully rich, And this morning, we're going to be thinking through, working through, verses 6 and 7. But here, God's Word beginning in Romans 1 and verse 1. Paul, a bondservant of Christ Jesus, a called apostle, having been set apart for the gospel of God, which he promised beforehand through his prophets in the Holy Scriptures, concerning his son, who, according to the flesh, was from the seed of David, and was declared to be the Son of God in power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations, including you who are called to belong to Jesus Christ. To all those in Rome, beloved by God, called to be saints, grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's pray. Father, we want to thank you for your wonderful love for us while we were yet sinners. Your love overflowed for us. And so, Father, we would just ask this morning for aching hearts, hurting hearts, confused hearts, tempted hearts, that you would shed abroad afresh this morning, pour out your love for us by the Holy Spirit, and that we would see that all of these things that Paul is articulating of who we are, are because of our union with your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, that we are called in Him, that we are loved in Him, that we are holy in Him, that even the grace and peace which are ours and which we so daily need to live out this holy calling are provided in Him. And so, Father, we would just ask this morning, work powerfully, effectually call your elect this morning, Father, I pray that by the time we leave here, we will understand better who we are and what we have in Christ. Lord, we love you and we thank you. Thank you for this letter called Romans. Would we feast on it? Would you feed us what we need this morning? Oh God, work in us, we ask. For the sake of your glory, we ask, and in the name of Christ, our Lord and Savior. Amen. Please be seated. Well, as I mentioned, we are closing Paul's opening greeting, and I trust that this final message, looking through verses 6 and 7, will be helpful to you. Two kind of headings that Paul wants us to see is who we are as God's people and what we have as God's people. And, as Martyn Lloyd-Jones helped me to remember, he said that so many of our problems as Christians is we forget who we are. We forget who we are in Christ. And so what Paul is doing here is he's reminding the recipients of the letter who they are. We've heard who Paul is. We've seen the man and his mission. We've seen that, yes, he is a doulos, or he's a bondservant, that he is a called apostle, that he's been set apart. We've seen his mission, namely to proclaim the gospel of God, which is centered on His Son, who is God Himself, who is the Messiah who redeems, who is the Lord who rules. Yes, we've seen that. We saw last week that Paul had received this grace and apostleship for a purpose, and it was to bring about the obedience of faith. for the sake of the name of Christ among all the nations." And this is the transition here, that Paul has been granted an authority by Christ to bring about obedience of faith among the nations. Now, this is just how Paul logically thinks. He says, that I have authority for all the nations, for all the Gentiles. You're Gentiles. Deduction? This is an authoritative word from the risen Christ through my pen to you Romans. This apostleship is for nations, your nations. This apostleship is for Gentiles, your Gentiles. So listen. So firstly, I want to look at who we are in Christ. Now, disclaimer, if you're not a Christian, you can't hang these on yourself. These are things that we are praying that you would become. But if you are in Christ, There's three things Paul says, three realities, three truths about who you are. And the reason why Paul is doing this at the beginning of the letter is because he's gonna have a lot of ethical imperatives. He's gonna say, this is how we ought to live as God's holy people. But before you can live as you ought, you ought to know who you are. And only the Holy Spirit can communicate these truths to you, these realities to you. Firstly, Paul wants these Christians to understand that they are called ones, that they are called to belong to Christ. Secondly, and I'm going to argue foundationally, he wants them to know that they are dearly loved by God the Father. And thirdly, he wants them to know that they have been set apart to be holy. Well, that's the first point. The second point, which we're going to look at, is what is theirs in Christ? What does God give to His called ones? What does He give to His beloved? What does He give to the holy ones? He gives them grace, and He gives them peace purchased by none other than His Son, the Eternal One, the Messiah, the Lord, Jesus Christ. So let's get into it. Let's get into it. Firstly, If you are in Christ, you need to firstly understand that you are called. You see that in verse six? That Paul is seeking to preach the gospel which produces the obedience of faith among the nations, including you. It's very emphatic in the Greek, actually. It's very interesting. He would say, in which you, even you, are the called ones of Christ. Even you! That's how I would translate it. And why would Paul say that? Because we're going to look at the rest of Romans 1, and we're going to see what the Romans were like by nature outside of Christ. Handed over, given up, delivered over, committing abominable deeds that are unspeakable. You would almost have to make some of these sermons in Romans 1, PG 13. And here were these Christless ones. In the language of Ephesians 2, they were separated from Christ. They were not fellow citizens with the commonwealth of Israel. They were not participants in the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. That's who these Romans were before the good news and the glad tidings came from Jerusalem, from these converted Jews who returned back and preached Christ to the Jew and to the Greek. Even you Romans, even you can be called. This is wonderful confidence. What I want you to see that when we look at the calling and the being loved and the holiness, these are all actions performed by God. You're a Christian here this morning, not because you firstly called upon the name of the Lord, which you did. You're not a Christian here this morning because you love God, though you do. You're not a Christian because you are set apart for holiness, though you pursue it. You are a Christian by the sovereign grace of God, who called you when you were dead in your sins, who loved you when you were unlovable, who set you apart, 1 Peter says, when you were dead. What Paul wants us to understand this morning of all these glorious realities is that they find their source in who God is and what he has done for us in Christ. We are but merely the beneficiaries of God's actions, of God's call, of God's love, of God's wholly setting us apart. Where then is boasting? It's excluded. And this is very practical. I know I'm going to talk about God's love for us, but for that last verse, I just closed my eyes and I listened to voices. For my Savior loves me so, he will hold me fast. It's not because I love him so, I will hold me fast. And I could hear voices behind me, and I knew of trials that these Christians are going through. Nothing can be more practical to hurting Christians, tempted Christians, depressed Christians, than to remember God's electing love for them, for God's unconditional love for them, for God's purposes of grace for them. This is practical. And so firstly, Paul wants them to know that even they These wretched pagans were nonetheless called. Now this is helpful for us to know theology. You need to understand that in the scriptures, there's two kinds of calls. And it's important because some people mix them up. There's what you would call the outward call, the universal call of the gospel. If you're writing down scriptures, Jesus himself uses when he sends his disciples out and he commissions them to preach the good news. But not all will believe because Jesus says, many are called, but few are chosen. And what Jesus is saying is that when they go out preaching the good news, when they're preaching the gospel, when you are preaching the gospel, as you're leading family devotions, there's this outward call. You're calling on your children, you're calling on your co-workers. If you're street preaching, you're calling on everyone who has ears to hear, to believe and to repent. That's the outward universal call. But that's not how Paul uses this word. Paul uses this word, call, to refer to God's effectual call. And if you don't like those words, that's OK. You have to learn it. I still remember 20 years ago, about to this day, when me and Christina, she was in Indiana. I was in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and I was coming to what you call the Doctrines of Grace. And I was reading a small little booklet that I had purchased by a man named Martin Lloyd-Jones, and it was called Effectual Calling. And I remember Christina saying, why do you gotta use these big words? I'm like, I don't know, it's just what Lloyd-Jones says. And what Lloyd-Jones was articulating in that is that God's call is effective. When God calls, We respond. And so there's the outward call that's happening right now as I command you in the name of Christ, kids, to repent. I am commanding you with the authority of the scriptures to repent, but it will only remain outward and ineffective, ineffective. unless the Holy Spirit takes that summons and transforms you inwardly with an effectual inward call, where the Spirit applies the outward call inwardly and changes the heart. And I can't think of a better place to show this than in 2 Corinthians. Yes, I can show you this later in Romans 8, but the best way, at least right now in my mind, to show you this is 2 Corinthians chapter 4, and I would encourage you to turn there, because you need to see this. Because this will change how you pray, and hopefully how you preach the gospel. See, when Paul came to Corinth in 1 Corinthians 2, he did not come with lofty speech. And that's how we often think in North America, that people are converted when we're really clever with our speech, when we have a nice gold tongue with big words and fancy illustrations and puppy dogs to tear at your heartstrings. Now, those aren't bad things, but they do not produce conversion. They can manipulate people, which is why so many churches in North America are filled with unbelievers. Look in verse four. No, I'm gonna start in verse one. Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, or literally having received mercy, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced disgraceful underhanded ways. See, if God saves his elect through an effectual call when the word is preached, you don't have to be clever. You don't need to pull bait and switches. You don't need to dupe people and give them all kinds of worldly enticements. You preach the Word in season and out of season. Why? Because you believe there's something called an effectual call that God issues to the elect when the Word is preached. This is why Paul says we have renounced disgraceful methodologies. We don't need to be underhanded, clever. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's Word. Oh, that preachers would understand this. They'd be on their knees more. but rather by the open statement of the truth, and that's the gospel. We would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. Here it is. And even if our gospel, it is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. In their case, the God of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers. If you're an unbeliever here this morning, you're blind. You're dead by birth, and you're blind in deception. That's not good. So what is the remedy, Paul? The remedy is verse 5. What do you do to those who cannot see Christ? What do you do to those who have uncircumcised ears? What do you do for those whose heart is like stone? You preach to them. You see that? For what we proclaim is not ourselves. I don't want to get into church bashing, but oh, that we would just preach Christ in season and vowed of season. I still remember my first Sunday when you guys full-heartedly, perhaps, flew us in from Toronto and said, I could probably fill this church. Not because I'm great, but if you preach tickling messages to tickling ears, people will come. But we are going to be faithful. Whether the church is full or empty, we are going to proclaim Jesus Christ as what? As Lord. And this picks up on our last message, that Jesus is the resurrected Son in power, who is seated at the right hand of God, who has poured out the Spirit, who is saving his people as they preach the gospel to the nations. We preach Jesus Christ as Lord. So that's what Paul's saying is the outward call. When Paul is preaching in Corinth, say, in Acts 18. Do you remember in Acts 18 when Paul wants to throw in the towel and give? Give up the mission. Do you know what God does? He visits him. The Lord visits him in a dream. And you know what he says to Paul? Don't lose heart. Why? I have many people in this city. Preach the word, Paul. Proclaim not yourself. Proclaim the gospel. So that people's faith might not rest in your wisdom and oratory, but in the power of God to the glory of Christ. We proclaim not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your slaves for Jesus' sake. Here it is. Here's the effectual call. Verse five is the outward call, and it's needed. People cannot be saved if they don't hear outwardly the gospel. Faith comes by hearing. That's why Paul says, send me to Spain. I'm going to preach the gospel. But I think he would say not only send me, but pray for me. Why? Because verse 6 starts with a very important conjunction, for. Why do you preach, Paul? For God who said. So this is what happens when someone is converted. The gospel enters into their outer ear. And as it were, say this morning, you're converted this morning. You're hearing words come from my mouth to your ears. That's the outward call. And you say, well, Pastor Ryan spoke and I believed. Yes, but that's not ultimately why you believed. You believed because God spoke. That's what Luther would say. That when a preacher is preaching accurately, faithfully, the gospel, the word of God, God speaks. And that's what Paul says in Thessalonians, you heard my preaching, not as the word of man, but as it really is, the word of God, which is at work in you. And so this is how you pray for your children. One, that they would be alert enough to pay attention to the gospel that is being preached from the pulpit. But ultimately, you want God to speak to their hearts. For God who spoke, let light shine out of darkness. Where does that come from? Paul's quoting the Old Testament there. I know, Klosnos, Genesis 1. God speaks in Genesis 1 with an effectual call. When God says, let there be, there is. Let there be, there is. That's an effectual call. There's no resistance. And that should give you the greatest courage and confidence to preach the word in season and out of season. They will come when God summons. When Jesus calls the fishermen, they come. When Jesus calls Lazarus out of the grave, he comes. Lazarus isn't sitting there dead with his free will saying, I don't think so. Jesus says, Lazarus, rise. That's an effectual call. God speaks in Genesis 1. That's an effectual call. And Paul is applying this spiritually to conversion. The first creation, effectual call. God's word is powerful. Spiritually, in the new creation, God creates by his word, which is why you preach the gospel. The Romans were dead. They were in darkness, blinded by Satan, worshiping idols. What has brought about this change? Someone preached to them the gospel, and it was attended by the Spirit's power. And God drew them irresistibly to himself. They gladly and willingly and joyfully came to Christ when he effectually called them. God gave the darkness light, and the light is seen in the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Who are you, hurting Christian? Who are you, tempted Christian? Who are you, discouraged Christian? You're elect. God called you when you had no desire to come to you. He awakened you. He said, somehow, maybe through a parent, maybe through a sermon, maybe through reading, awake, oh sleeper, and rise from the dead. Christ has shone on you. That's who you are. You're called. And in Roman society, they loved all kinds of hierarchies. And so you want to be the rich guy, or you want to be the nobleman. You want to belong to the household of Caesar. You want to be distinguished. You want to be a called one in society. And Paul says, oh, you Romans, though the scourge of the earth may be a slave of all, you're called and chosen. You're called and chosen. The second thing, and I would say the greatest thing, is that you're loved or dearly loved or best beloved of God. And I was reading John Owen last night. which is good. Whenever I'm discouraged, I find such refuge in that man's writings. And I was reading Communion with the Triune God, and I was going over again the first part of Communion with Father, and he speaks about so much of God's love for us. And he said that, yes, there is an election and a calling, but he likened that to the streams which flow into the fountain or the source, which is the love of God. Why did God call you? Because He loved you. That's the source. That's the fountainhead. And he says what we always need to do with all of God's blessings, now we're just looking at calling and sainthood, if you will, but he says whatever the spiritual blessing is, they all can be traced back to the source, which is the love of God. He says just as you would trace back the heat you feel from the sun, you follow those rays of sun, but the source is not the sun ray, it's the sun itself. And so whatever blessing you have this morning, It finds its source, its origin, in God's unconditional, eternal love for you. That's what you need to hear. That's why I was so emotional when I came in. For my Savior what? Called me so? True. For my Savior loves me so. Why will He keep you? Because He loves you. Why does He love you? Because He loves you. If you ever want to memorize a verse, actually, just turn there. I can quote it, and you cannot see it. Turn to Deuteronomy 7, and Moses preparing the people of Israel to enter into the land without him. He's preaching sermons. Deuteronomy is a collection of sermons, and he's reminding the people of Israel who they are in light of who God is. Right? That's what Paul's doing. He's reminding them, you need to remember who you are. If Lloyd-Jones is correct, and I believe he is, so many of our problems find its source that we forgot who we are, and we've forgotten who God is. So look at Deuteronomy chapter 7, verse 7, just so easy, just think of 7-7. Verse 6 says, for you are a people holy to the Lord your God, and we're gonna see that in Romans 1. The Lord your God has chosen you, that's called, to be a people for his own treasured possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. And you might think, well, of course God chose them. They're awesome. That's how we think. God called me because I first called him. It's this cosmic phone tag. No. We think, well, God loves me because I first loved him. Or that God said his love on me because I'm holy, because I have something to offer him. Absolutely not. Verse seven, it was not because you were more in number, right? God's like, okay, of course, when we're picking hockey teams, I know who to pick. No, that's not how God works, because he will share his glory with no other. It was not because, Israel, you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples. Verse eight, Rather, it is because the Lord loves you. And I still remember this conundrum. I was with Sam and Deanne's youngest son, Brent, and we were working through a book by Graham Goldsworthy, and it just struck him and me that God loves us because he loves us. Oh, so he loves us because he loves us. But why does he love us because he loves us? Well, you can just keep doing that ad infinitum. He loves you because he loves you because he loves you. And do you see here that God's election and calling of us flow out of his love? And I struggle with why so many Christians kick against the goads of this glorious doctrine. It's the thing that will actually fill their hearts with humility and hopefully confidence. That there was nothing good in us that caused God to choose us. So is there something in you that can forfeit that love? If He loved you before He created you, is there something you can do to disqualify? No, it's unconditional love. I also want you to go to Jeremiah 31.3. This has been helpful for me. If you're suffering, memorize this verse. Here is God speaking to the people of Israel in exile, who's about to do a wonderful work of redemption and pull them out of bondage. And why is he going to save them? Why is he gonna call them out of the darkness of Babylon? Because he loves them. Oh, because they cleaned up their act and got it all together when they're in Babylon? No, absolutely not. It had nothing to do with them. God's love for us has nothing to do with us. It has everything to do with Him. Jeremiah 31.3, the Lord appeared to him from far away, and you could add in brackets, and said, I have loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore, I have continued my faithfulness to you." Or some of your translations might say, therefore, I've drawn you in my faithfulness. Why does God draw us to himself in his chesed? Why is God faithful to draw us? Why is God faithful to call us? Because He set His love upon us. That's so freeing. Let the world despise, forsake me. I have the smile of God on me. Let the world scoff and deride and mock and ridicule. Let them even persecute and hate me. God loves me unconditionally. How freeing is that? I have loved you. Some of you are suffering right now. Hear that, Christian. God has loved you. He didn't begin to love you. He has loved you with a temporary, ephemeral love. No, no, no, with an unchanging, everlasting love. Why does God put up with you, Christian? Why does he not cast you away for your silliness and folly and high-handed sin? Why is Ryan not in hell right now? Because God set his love upon me, and he has continued with me in his faithfulness. God does not remove his chesed because he has set his love upon us. Why can Israel, coming back into the promised land, be called Aholiab? Loved of the Father! Is it because she's so good? No, it's because he is so good. I'm all over the place, but my mind is flying. Go to Ephesians 1. We're still thinking about God's wonderful calling of us, which is sourced and rooted in his love for us. You ladies, I know, have gone through this, but it's good to stir ourselves up by way of reminder because we can hear about it on a Monday and forget about it by Tuesday. Verse 1, and you being dead. This is the state humanity is in by nature, a state of deadness. This is why God has to speak life and light. into our lives because we are dead and unable to hear. We were dead in trespasses and sins in which we once walked. following the age, the course of this world, following or literally according to the prince of the power of the air, that spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. This was Rome before the gospel intruded, before the gospel erupted into their lives. This was them, this was us. Among whom? It's the exact same Greek as Romans 1. Among whom you are also the called. You were once among the dead, now you are among the living. What has brought about this change? God's love. Among whom we all formerly once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and by nature, children of wrath like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, What does it say? Mercy is not the source of God's call. Love is the source of mercy which brought the call. Do you see that? God is rich in mercy because of the great love which he loved us. Even when we were dead, he made us alive together. That's the effectual call. He said, Christina, live. Why? Because he's merciful. Why? Because he set his love on you. When will we stop kicking against this glorious doctrine God loved us with an everlasting love. And the effect of that love is that he drew us, sweetly drew us in, else we had still refused to taste and perished in our sin. Why was I made to hear thy voice and enter Waldo's room when thousands make a wretched choice and rather starve than come? You know what the answer is to that hymn? God's love. Why do the nations perish? Why are your neighbors in darkness? Why do people die in their sin and not you? Because God loved you. So you might not be the richest or the handsomest. You might not be the brightest. That's okay. The most glorious expression of God's goodness to you is that he has loved you, even when you were dead, even when you were an enemy, even when you were unholy, ungodly, even when you hated him, he still loved you and saved you by his grace. Isn't that wonderful? that this love of Ephesians 2 finds its origin in God. In love, he predestined us. In love, he calls us. In love, he keeps us. In love, he will glorify us. In love, we will enjoy him forever. God is love. And if you love him this morning, John says there's only one reason. It's because he first loved you. Nathan, I loved all the songs you picked, or maybe you and your bride. They focus so much on God's love. Why do we love those songs? Because that's what we need to hear. You need to hear of God's love. I need to hear of God's love. If you were to catalog, I wrote all my favorite hymns out, and I thought they're almost all about the love of God. And the reason why Paul is reminding them of God's love is because there's going to be some hard things they need to do. But then they might say something like this, love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, demands my all. There's another wonderful hymn, love makes obedience sweet. It is the obedience of faith, yes, but that obedience is carried out in the heart, which is ravished by love. So are you struggling with obedience? Yes, you need faith, but oh, that you would be reminded of God's wonderful love. Yes, he has called you. You are among the called. but you are among the called because you are among God's beloved, God's wonderful, wonderful love to you. Lastly, look at Romans 8. I'm not going to preach this, but I do want to show you with one last hammer strike to sort of get this into our hearts. Have you ever thought about why people love Romans 8 so much? I think it's because it's totally concentrated with this concept of God's love. And now, Romans 8 is all about Christians who are suffering. And what do suffering Christians need? They need to be reminded that they are loved of God. They need to be reminded of God's goodness to them in Christ. So we start in verse 28. And we know that for those who love God, all things are working together for good for those who are called. Okay, those who are called are those who are loved, and we love because He loves. We're called according to His purpose, for those whom God foreknew. Now, I'm going to translate that right now. for those whom God foreloved." I'm not going to get into the nitty-gritty of it, but I'll show you from the Old Testament that that word foreknew is best translated foreloved. Those whom God set his love upon in eternity past, is my paraphrase, he also predestined. Remember I said that love is the fountainhead, the source from which all these other graces flow out of? He foreloved us and predestined us to be conformed to the image of His beloved Son in order that He might become the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom He predestined, He called. And those whom He called, He justified. And those whom He justified, He glorified. All those flow out of God's love. And then Paul applies it to us. If God so loves us, you might say, what then? Who could say anything against you, Sonia? Who can say anything against you, whether human or demon? Who shall bring any charge? Who shall call out the called-in ones? It's a play on words in the Greek, right? You're the called ones. Who's going to call you out? Who's going to fact-check you? God loves me. It doesn't matter what anyone thinks. He who did not spare his own son. What is the surest illustration and example of God's love? How does God, as it were, put his money where his mouth is? This eternal, everlasting love is shown to be true in the giving of his son. And this is an argument from the greater to the lesser. Your beloved, how do I know? My life stinks right now. How do I know God loves me? He sent his son for you. That's what Christians need to remember. We often think that God doesn't love us because of circumstances and bad things that are happening. I think about that. And so what does Ryan need? Sort of be regrounded, recalibrated, reoriented. I need to go back to the source. I need to remember that God loves me in Christ. That God loved the world. He loved Gentiles too, and he sent his son. He gave his son. He who spared not his own son, but gave him. Love gives. God's best expression of love is the giving of his son for us all. How will he not also with him graciously give us all things? He's shown his love for us in giving us the son. Everything else is perfumed by love, even the trials you're going through. Christ right now is interceding, and so Paul says in verse 35, now listen to the focus of love. This is why we inherently love Romans 8 so much. Who shall separate us from what? The doctrine of God. That could be there, but Paul wants to comfort Christians who are hurting. He wants to heal Christians who are divided. We're gonna see that in Romans 14 and 15. What unites a church? the doctrine of God's love, and the expression of it in the gospel of his Son. What shall separate us from the love of Christ? So some of you can identify with these words. Shall tribulation? No. In the Greek, the answer is implied for every one of these, no. If I was a charismatic preacher, I would preach and you'd go, no! And then I'd say something and you'd go, no! But we're not gonna do that, because we're boring Baptists. Shall tribulation? No. Distress? No. Persecution? No. Famine? No. Nakedness? No. Danger? No. Sword? No. Verse 7, no. In all these things we overwhelmingly conquer, that's how I would translate it, through him who, what does it say? Who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from what? The love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. So this is the gospel of God's love, but Paul would say it's concerning his son. And the son who was given is the eternally begotten God. He is the incarnated son as Messiah, and he is the resurrected son of God in power and Lord. Who are you this morning, Christian? You're amongst the called. Christ. God has called you to belong to Christ. That's better than anything else in the world. There's many things we wish we were called to. Nobility, riches, honor, glory, whatever country you wish you could live in. You've been called to belong to Christ, and you've been called to belong to Christ because God the Father set his love upon you in eternity past. Now, you can kick against it, or you can just surrender to that sweet, sweet love. Just receive it. Owen says, you receive this seemingly unworthy love by faith. You would think, why would God ever love me? Because he's God. I would never love me, but I'm not God. Thirdly, you're called to be a saint. Now, some of you might have Catholic friends, and they like to use this word, and they would say, no, you become a saint after you die, and they verify that you've done, you know, certain miracles and all kinds of other rubbish. But Paul says that everyone who is in Christ is a saint, or is a holy one. That's maybe a better translation. And what Paul's doing here is he's sneakily including them into not only the purposes of God, but he's actually saying that you also belong to the kingdom of God here. So Paul is using identical Greek here as in verse one. Paul is a called apostle. They are called saints. It's almost identical in the Greek. Meaning what? That just says God had a purpose for calling Paul, right? He had a purpose for Paul in his kingdom. If you're a Christian, God has a purpose for you in his kingdom. It's not he just calls Paul and Peter and maybe a pastor here and a deacon there. No, everyone belongs to Christ. Everyone has been set apart for a purpose. He has set you apart to be one of his holy ones. And yes, it has to do with status. You are holy in the holy one, just like you are loved in the loved one or you're chosen in the chosen one. But what Paul's gonna get at, he's gonna say, become what you are. Right? Why should we be loving to others? Because we are loved by God. Actually, I'm in point three, but it just hit me now. Go to Romans 16 later this afternoon and circle the word beloved. It's always used of Paul to other Christians. Why would Paul do that? We can call others beloved because we are first beloved. Why can we be holy? Because God has called us to be holy. We have been set apart by Him and for Him. Why can you pursue holiness? because God has set you apart to be holy. Does that make sense? You are called, you are loved, and you've been called to be a saint. You've been called to be a holy one. And it's important to remember that because all of these words in the Old Testament were used for God's people Israel. And Paul is saying that in Christ, even if you're a Gentile, all of these now belong to you, the true Israel. Israel was called. Israel was loved. Israel were the holy ones. And Paul is saying that if you have believed the gospel, if you are in Christ by faith, irrespective of what you feel, all of these truths belong to you. Well, let's get into the second point quickly. Firstly, who they were, okay? Three things. Elect, loved, holy. Amazingly, as Paul moves on from this idea of being holy ones, he reminds us what we have. Who we are in Christ, what we have in Christ. You see that? Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Just as Paul needed grace for his apostleship, you need grace for your holiness. You tracking with that? God calls Paul, but he also equips Paul. We saw that last week. He doesn't say, okay, Paul, I chose you to be an apostle. Now muster up enough strength as you can. Try your hardest. Pull up your bootstraps a little higher. Still don't know what that means. No, Paul, I have called you, and I've given you grace to be an apostle. And he's saying to you Romans, and he's saying to us Christians, he has called us with a holy calling, and he has equipped us to carry out this holy calling. It'd be like the business guy, okay? I hire Nathan, you know, into my corporation, and we like to, you know, buy things and then sell them for more. But what if I don't give him any money? How's he gonna carry out his calling? Well, I need you to equip him, don't I? And that's what Paul's saying. You are loved and you are called. He calls you. He sets you apart to be holy. How in the world can you be holy? He gives you His grace. And I would encourage you nerdies like me, go and read Romans 6, and it'll put it together for you. How can you live obedient lives of righteousness to the glory of God? By the power of grace. And he's already hinting at it here. How can you be holy? By God's grace. And he gives grace to all the saints, not some, not to the smart or the gifted, not to the rich. He gives it to all, all who are in Christ get all of God's grace. It's God's unmerited favor. And this idea of grace, it focuses on or highlights or emphasizes the unworthiness of the recipient. It's a gift. We don't deserve to be saved, we don't deserve to be equipped, but this is the God of all grace we're dealing with. Not only does the Father give us his grace in Christ, he gives us peace. And as Frank Thielman, one of the commentators, said, it's important to sort of get these words at least in the back of our minds because Paul's going to return to them frequently. What the believers need in Rome more than anything else is God's grace and peace operating in their lives. Right? They're suffering, Romans 8. They're divisive, Romans 14. They're struggling. Maybe that's you this morning. What do you need more than anything else? This grace and this peace. And it comes to us from this Father, as we saw in Sunday School, who loves to give. The Father of lights. He loves to give good gifts to all his children. And he equips them with grace, and he reminds them of the peace they have. The reason why there's often so little peace between others is because we've, as Christians, forgotten about our peace with God. So say me and Tony are getting at it, and we're angry at each other, and we're at it. The problem is there's no peace between us. So what do we focus on? Eliminating the beef between us, maybe. But actually, what we should both do is remember that we have peace with God. And that we're in this now realm of grace, says Romans 5, and we can now live together harmoniously as those who have been saved together, justified together, forgiven together. We both have peace with God. Now we can have peace with each other. Paul's going to be calling for peace within the congregation of Rome. But before he makes that ethical demand of them, he reminds them of the truth, that you have peace. You have peace with God in and through our Lord Jesus Christ. So this is just a wonderful reminder to these Christians of who they are in Christ and what they have in Christ. It's good to do an inventory at times. We're gonna get into the next section, but in this small little salutation, Paul is reminding them of some eternally important truths. And I love how Paul loves to hijack the things of the day and infuse them with the gospel. Remember in our first sermon, the typical letter, you know, in Rome or in the Roman world back then was like your typical guy texting his wife. Brian, wife, howdy. That's all it was. Who's sending it? Who's receiving it? And they give the Greek words karein, which means greetings. That's just guys. And Paul says, oh, I've got so much more to say. Who I am. Who you are. And we have grace in the Lord Jesus Christ. So that's my admonition to you this morning, is that you would reflect and meditate on those things. Remember them, stir them up, as it were, by way of reminder. Remember that God has called you. Remember he has loved you. Remember what He has given to you, that you might become holy and blameless in His sight. He's given you grace, and He's given you peace. We've seen God's attitude, and we've seen God's action for us in Christ. His attitude is love, His action is calling, and our response is the obedience of faith. You know what gets your heart to want to obey Christ? You know what constrains you, like Paul in 2 Corinthians 5? It's the love of God in Christ. And sometimes it's good just to gaze on it, to let it melt our hearts, take a frost off, allow it to sweeten some of the mara that has come into our hearts. It's a wonderful thing to gaze upon who we are in Christ, founded in the Father's electing love for us. And I would summon you this morning, if you're not a Christian, believe the gospel. Believe it. And we're praying, O Holy Spirit, bring light, bring life, bring Christ. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your goodness to us. And maybe we're not living in Rome, but we might be able to say as your holy people that even of those that you've called to the obedience of faith includes even us. Lord, we would have never chosen ourselves. We would have never loved ourselves the way we should. We would have never set ourselves apart. But this is why we worship you, or this is why we ought to worship you. that is from you and through you and to you are all things, including all of these glorious realities of who we are in Christ. All these glorious realities, Father, that flow from you through Christ by the Spirit, all of these things are to redound to your glory. And so, Father, I don't truly understand how the preached word can be attended by the spirit and not only bring about regeneration, but can also bring comfort to those who are hurting, can bring life to those, Lord, who need revival, can bring a renewed vigor for holiness to those who are languishing. Father, I pray, help us as we unpack these things throughout Romans, that our hearts would be aflame, and that we would increasingly, by faith, become obedient to the Lordship of Christ, for the sake of His name among all the nations. O God, help us to meditate on the gospel this day, we ask, and help us to meditate on it tomorrow. And Lord, for the some of us who are fighting against it, we just want to maybe hold on to something. O Lord, loosen that tenacious grip we have with our fingers. Loosen it by your grace and by your love, we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.