followHIM - Romans 7-16 Part 1 • Dr. Joshua Matson • Aug 14 - Aug 20

Episode Date: August 9, 2023

How does being called to be a Saint change your thoughts and behaviors? Dr. Joshua Matson examines how Jewish Christians and non-Jewish Christians learn to become one people in Jesus and explores grace, works, and mercy.00:00 Part 1–Dr. Joshua Matson01:40 Introduction of Dr. Joshua Matson04:40 Background to today’s lesson06:45 Emphasizing the good08:01 Mapping Paul’s journey and what’s next10:42 Paul carrying contributions for years12:30 Marriage analogy14:14 The gospel spreads quickly16:30 Paul gives two introductions and reasons for writing17:18 First introduction and call to be Chrisitlike 19:14 Grace and loving kindness21:46 Salutations and thanksgiving22:18 What to do with these teachings22:57 Romans 7 and Jewish law27:34 Romans 7:8 and love31:00 The law of Moses32:32 What should worship look like?35:15 Jesus elevates our focus37:04 The Book of Mormon and the law of Moses38:33 Paul mentions something personal41:13 Who will be redeemed from physical and spiritual death?45:06 Paul before and after Jesus47:08 Where to locate additional Joseph Smith Translation (JST)49:18 Writing is a difficult medium50:01 The Spirit empowers our lives53:31 Sister Nelson on love and marriage56:09 The Spirit’s direction59:17 Being spiritually minded1:02:08 Christian’s true identity1:06:02 End of Part 1–Dr. Joshua MatsonPlease rate and review the podcast!Show Notes (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese): https://followhim.coYouTube: https://youtu.be/R1eqqsj-iekFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/followhimpodcastInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/followhimpodcastSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/15G9TTz8yLp0dQyEcBQ8BYThanks to the follow HIM team:Shannon Sorensen: Cofounder, Executive Producer, SponsorDavid & Verla Sorensen: SponsorsDr. Hank Smith: Co-hostJohn Bytheway: Co-hostDavid Perry: ProducerKyle Nelson: Marketing, SponsorLisa Spice: Client Relations, Editor, Show NotesJamie Neilson: Social Media, Graphic DesignAnnabelle Sorensen: Creative Project ManagerWill Stoughton: Video EditorKrystal Roberts: Translation Team, English & French Transcripts, WebsiteAriel Cuadra: Spanish Transcripts"Let Zion in Her Beauty Rise" by Marshall McDonaldhttps://www.marshallmcdonaldmusic.com

Hello, my friends. Welcome to another episode of Follow Him. My name is Hank Smith. I'm your host. I'm here with the incredible John, by the way. Hello, John. Hi, Hank. Good to be back. Yep, we're back for another week. John, we've been through the first half of the book of Romans, and now we're going to take on the second half. In your experience with Romans, what are you looking forward to? It's kind of like the second two-thirds. And I feel like we're watching Paul have the same challenge. We've got Jewish converts who become Christians, and we've got Greek converts who have never been Jews. And he's trying to get them all together and figure out how to say the law of Moses is fulfilled and the law of the gospel. And how do I explain that and get everybody united? A major challenge. The more I'm reading this, the more I think this, yeah, this must've been really hard. So I'm looking forward to seeing how he does it.

Absolutely. Joining us this week is Dr. Josh Madsen. Josh, what do our listeners have to look forward to here in the second half of Romans? Well, I think of all the texts that we could talk about that Paul wrote that are equivalent to our day, Romans is probably the one that I would turn to first. There are so many parallels that Paul is going to talk about that mirror the challenges and situations of our own day that we can learn so many great things to help us become better Christians by following the teachings of Paul in our day, that we can learn so many great things to help us become better Christians by following

the teachings of Paul in our day, not just in Paul's day. Beautiful. I'm really looking forward to this discussion. John, why don't you introduce Josh to our listeners? They may remember him from last year. Yes, we've had Dr. Joshua Mattson before. We're so glad that you're back today. I'm really looking forward to this.

Josh holds a PhD in religion from Florida State University with an emphasis in religions of Western antiquity and a minor in American religious history. He also holds a Master of Arts degree from Trinity Western University in Biblical Studies and a Bachelor of Arts degree with university honors from brigham young university in ancient near eastern studies that's awesome he's been all over while completing research for his dissertation on you ready for this hank on the status of the hebrew bible minor

prophets in the late second temple period which okay which we call hbmpst josh he lived with this family in the holy land was a research associate with the scripta cumronica electronica project at the university of haifa and an orion center for the study of the dead sea scroll scholar at the hebrew university of jerusalem is that That's amazing. And right now, he is one of the editors in one of the volumes of the BYU New Testament Commentary series, which is online. He's from Chubbuck, Idaho. He married the former Aaron Barnes together. They're parents of four children. He loves books, running, traveling, and sports. And we're just glad that you love Follow Him and would be willing to come back. Hey, John, Josh, and sports. And we're just glad that you love follow him and would be willing

to come back. Hey, John, Josh, before we get into the material, I just want to give a quick shout out. My family and I were up hiking in Utah County yesterday. And as we approached a beautiful waterfall, we were sitting there gawking at it and loving it. Someone called out my name. And so I turned around, I didn't know who these people were, but they are big fans of the podcast and they were happy to run into me and I was happy to run into them. So Dave and Julianne McMillan, thank you so much for listening and saying hi out there on the trail. Oh, Hank and I had a chance to participate in a Nauvoo experience with the cast of the Nauvoo pageant. And I got taught how to do the motions and everything and run around on the stage. And I met a wonderful young man named Russell Heaton. I wanted to give him a shout out too. So thanks, Russell, for listening to the

podcast. That's awesome. We love all of our listeners, really. John, I was telling the McMillans, they were saying, thank you so much for doing this. And I'm saying, thank you so much for listening. So thank you to everyone listening. And Hank, if I can, can I just tell you what I love about this is in Romans, Paul is giving a shout out to similar people. So I think we're doing a very biblical activity here

is being able to reach out to those who help move the work forward. So, it's kind of fun to hear this and hear this on previous podcasts and think, hey, this is a very biblical thing to do. Hey, that's fantastic. We'll keep it up then. Maybe we'll have to do it more, John. That's what we meant. Yeah, that was it. Yeah, we were very biblical. We were being Paul-like. Yeah. Hey, Josh, I want to read a part of the manual and then we'll kind of hand over the reins to you and go where you want to go. It says in the manual, as he opened his epistle to the Romans, Paul greeted church members by calling them beloved of God who are called to be saints.

He remarked that their faith was spoken of throughout the world. Even though Paul then spent much of his epistle correcting false ideas, flawed behaviors. It seems he also wanted to assure these new Christian converts that they truly were saints who were beloved of God. His tender counsel blesses all those who struggle to feel God's love and for whom becoming a saint may feel out of reach. I know I feel that way a lot of times. With humble empathy, Paul acknowledged that he felt like a wretched man at times, but the gospel of Jesus Christ had given him power to overcome sin. With that power,

the Savior's redeeming power, we can overcome evil, both evil in the world and evil in ourselves with good. I thought it was a beautiful opening paragraph. Josh, let's send the reins over to you. Where do you want to start here? Well, I think that statement is so good, Hank. To give us an understanding is at the outset, Paul is talking about the great things that he's heard about the saints in Rome. Unlike most of the other epistles that we're going to read throughout the rest of this year, Paul had never ministered to these individuals before. This is kind of a blind contact as it were. He had heard things, he knew about what those saints were doing in Rome, and he had never personally met most of them. And so writing this epistle might seem impersonal at first. It might seem like he's just writing into

the dark or into the void and hoping something will stick with these individuals. But he wants to make sure that they know that the good things that they've done have been recognized by him. And how important is that in our lives when seeking correction or giving correction to be able to start off with, hey, I've heard some really good things about what's going on. What you're doing is really good. Let's just fine tune some things. And I'm much more willing when those that are in authority over me come and say, Josh, hey, these are things you're doing really well. Let's work on this. The manual with Come Follow Me hits right on that Paul is wanting to emphasize you're doing good things.

Don't be discouraged. Again, as I had said at the outset, this epistle speaks to us. We might start to read through here and say, oh, I'm doing so terribly. But we need to go back and think of those words that we indeed are saints, that God recognizes that we have done great things and that we're called to be saints. I love the Greek for that word saints is agioi, and it means holy one or one set apart. For me, I think too much of the New Orleans saints when I hear saints sometimes, thinking of it as you are holy ones, you are set apart. That can be helpful even in the most

discouraging times when maybe we're not living up to what we're supposed to be, but that opportunity is still there. That's awesome. So, Josh, give us a little context here. What's happening in Rome? We covered a little bit of this last week, but let's hear it from you. What's happening in Rome and what is happening that's leading Paul to give this type of counsel? Yeah. So, the context we're looking probably in the late fifties AD. So Paul's within the last half to full decade of his life. This is towards the end of his third mission. One of the cool things for those who still use the old paper scriptures, you can flip to the back and those pictures that kept me entertained as a teenager in sacrament meeting, you'll see a map of Paul's journeys and missions.

This is towards the end of his third mission. So that the big mission that's going to take him throughout most of the Mediterranean and all's likely in Corinth, which is in modern day Greece, not too far outside of the city of Athens. So Paul's there, but he is starting to prepare for what's next. And what am I going to do next that the Lord needs me to do? I'm fulfilling this mission. Maybe there's some out there who have that same question. What's next for me? I'm turning one page in my life. Maybe I'm graduating high school and I'm just getting ready to start college or just start a mission. Maybe I'm just starting and getting married. Maybe I'm just getting ready to start college or just start a mission. Maybe I'm just starting and getting married. Maybe I'm just getting ready to retire and I'm wondering what's next. And that's where Paul's vision is, is his vision is what's next and he's putting his eyes westward. So he's going from the

Mediterranean region that he knows so well of modern day Greece and Turkey and the Holy Land. And he's starting to look further towards Italy and ultimately towards Spain. And we see this actually in chapter 15, as Paul is looking about all of these things that he's wanting to do. He says, I want to come to you in verse 24 of Romans 15. He says, when so ever, I don't know when, but whenever I do, I take my journey into Spain. He wants to go to Spain.

He wants to go to the far West and not far West Missouri, but he wants to go into the far West to preach the gospel to people who haven't heard it before. The gospel message has been preached now for about 30 years, and they're trying to find new fields that they can go that are ready to harvest. And so he wants to go to Spain, but before he goes to Spain, he says, I will come to you for, I trust to see you in my journey and to be brought on my way. The other word by you, if first I be somewhat filled with your company, but now I go on to Jerusalem to minister unto the saints. And so he knows that he has a mission that he needs to fulfill first. So he's in Corinth.

He needs to go back to Jerusalem. Why? Verse 26, for it hath pleased them of Macedonia and Achaia, that's modern day Turkey, to make a certain contribution for the poor saints, which are at Jerusalem. Here in Romans 15, 26, Paul talks about the fact that he has gone through Greece and Turkey, modern day Greece and Turkey, and he's received contributions for the poor that

are in Jerusalem. That was his original mission that was given to him at the Jerusalem council in Acts 15, 26 and 27. So if we go back to there we know that that's it this is six or seven years later i'm not very good at keeping my money in my pocket for six or seven minutes let alone six or seven years but paul has been receiving these contributions on his mission and he recognizes the sacredness of the funds that he's received. He says, I need to go back from Corinth to Jerusalem to make sure that I deliver those contributions to those to whom they were made. And then I want to come to you. I want to come to Rome and then I want to go to Spain. But for the astute student of these texts, you'll know that that's not how Paul ends up going to Rome. Paul is going to end

up going to Rome as it were in chains as a prisoner, as he appeals to Caesar because of the opposition that he's facing. And so I know that's kind of a lengthy history lesson of where Paul's been and where he's going. But when we know that context that he's writing to Roman saints that he doesn't know, the question I always ask is why is he writing to the Romans? If he's never been there, if he doesn't know them, like the other epistles, he's talking to friends that he converted and possibly we know from Acts baptize. Why is he writing to these individuals? And we said it at the outset, it's because of their faith, but it's also because of a major issue that is continually

causing problems for the moving forward of the work, the gathering of Israel. And that's trying to bring together those who come from a Jewish background into Christianity and those who come from a Christian background into Christianity. And Paul says it best, and maybe this is how we jump into the text from that introduction, is if we go to Romans 7, where our block starts this week in Come Follow Me, Paul compares what's happening in the church to marriage. And so this marriage analogy at first, you might sit there and go, wait a second, we're talking about divorce. So are the Jews being divorced from Judaism and then becoming Christians and the Gentiles divorcing? I don't think that's what Paul's trying to say. I think of it more in light of my own marriage or the marriage of many of our listeners.

How many of us came into a marriage not fully understanding the background that our spouses had in their lives? I think this is exemplified by a coworker. We were talking recently and they said, I didn't know that in my husband's family, they always go to Lake Powell on Christmas. And there's a lot of contention about, well, do we go to Lake Powell or do we not go to Lake Powell for Christmas? Because my family has its own traditions. And that's what I think Paul is trying to get at is those who have come into Christianity, no matter what their background,

they're intermingling with people who have different backgrounds and are coming with different traditions, understandings, and knowledge. And in Rome, that is at the forefront of what's causing the church to stumble is because people from one background are fighting with those of another background. And Paul's trying to act as it were as a mediator to be able to say, no, we are all Christians. We're going to make this work. Divorce is not an option. We need to find out how we're going to become the best that we can become. Is there any evidence or anything we can point to, to where Paul got this information about the Romans? Is it from his friends, Priscilla and Aquila, who I think who had lived in Rome previous?

Yeah, so this is such a great question, Hank. As I think about it this way, as the church is growing, we don't have leaders who are being set to be able to overwatch what's happening. A great example of this we actually see in Thessalonians, because from the evidence in the text, Paul was only in Thessalonica, probably only three weeks. And he's preaching the gospel and he's baptizing and then he's forced out of town. So then the question becomes, well, what happened? They're on their own.

Exactly. Word's going to get around and people are going to travel through. Well, not to overuse the phrase, all roads lead to Rome, but as Christians are traveling and as news is traveling, we don't have a ton of information about who actually converted most of these Christians. Some of them may have been displaced from other areas where Christianity had already been preached by Paul on his previous two missions. And that as the Roman empire is moving people from the Holy land to Italy or to Rome, as they're moving people from other places.

You've got people who are converted Christians and now they're living in Rome. You've got Jews all the way starting in the mid second century BC who are being moved to Rome because of rebellions or are immigrating to Rome for opportunities. And then they're hearing about this stuff about Jesus and they're becoming interested and they're hearing about this stuff about Jesus and they're

becoming interested in their hearing from friends that are coming, Hey, come to my church service because we don't have real churches. We're meeting in houses. So come. And if you love what you hear, then become Christian. We don't have a ton of background of where that is, but because of Christianity spread and Paul's travels and intermingling and that long list of individuals that I hope we'll get a chance to talk about in chapter 16, Paul is obviously aware of people that are there, but maybe they're people that he had converted along the way that are now in Rome and are trying to do the best in a church that doesn't have an infrastructure to succeed. I read somewhere also that in Acts chapter 2 at the day of Pentecost, there's visitors from Rome that have that experience with Peter. Men and brethren, what shall we do?

Repent and be baptized. So perhaps there were some who were at the day of Pentecost experience and went back to Rome. All right, Josh, what Paul's going to do is he gives two introductions to what he's trying to emphasize to the Roman saints. One introduction is in Romans 1 verses 7 and 8 in the introduction. And a second one is in Romans chapter 15 verses 14 through 33. It's almost like hiding the thesis at the end of the book. At the end, he's going to talk about some of those reasons of why he's writing. And so I think looking at both of those will help to illustrate what we'll talk about then as we go through chapters 7 through

16. So looking first at Romans chapter 1 verses 7 and 8, he says this, to all that be in Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints. And we talked about that word meaning holy ones or being set apart. Grace to you and the peace from God, our father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now here in verse seven, we get a word that can sometimes be complicated and carry a lot of baggage in religious tradition, which is this word grace. One of the things from a linguistic point of view is that the word here in Greek is charis, and it means loving kindness. This grace that comes is a loving kindness from our Savior, Jesus Christ. And that's going to be so vital as we read the rest of Romans, because Paul's emphasis to the saints is you

need to be more like the savior. Where is your grace or where is your loving kindness that is intended to be given to others? And there's a great definition for loving kindness in one of the linguistic dictionaries that I use. And it says this, that charis means a benefactor who gives something that cannot be repaid. Clients repay through faithfulness and good deeds. The grace, the loving kindness that's being given by Jesus Christ in this statement and through his atoning sacrifice, we can never repay. But what he expects us to do is to have faithfulness and to perform good deeds not necessarily just in our own private lives but especially in the lives of our neighbors so coming to those two great commandments to love god and love our neighbor that's what paul is

going to try and emphasize and we will come back to that again and again as we look at chapter 7 through 16 is where is your loving kindness to your neighbor where is your harris i'm grateful we're talking about this i think you're right that word grace can be a loaded word in religious context right someone's maybe had an experience in an argumentative type way saved by grace or saved by works. And so, when they see the word grace, they might be turned away where you're saying, don't turn away from that word. It's actually a word that we can love. It's a word we can incorporate into our religious vocabulary. Yeah. James will talk about this in James chapter two in his epistle, but faith and works, I love the analogy that was given in the old Institute manual that faith and

works are like two oars that you're using while rowing a canoe. You can't just use one cause you'll spin in circles. They both work hand in hand together. And so being able to understand what that grace is, it's something we can never repay. We can never work back, but that there is an expectation on our part to live up to that grace that we've received by being faithful and by doing good works. Another example that I love, C.S. Lewis used in Mere Christianity on the one I have, page 129. He said, Christians have often disputed as to whether what leads the Christian home is good actions or faith in Christ. Kind of a works grace thing. I have no right really to speak on such a difficult

question, but it does seem to me like asking which blade in a pair of scissors is most necessary. I love that one because you need them both. And to have C. lewis saying that i think it is wonderful i'd never heard that thanks john john another reason i love what you're saying is that's the exact problem that paul is facing with the roman saints you have the jewish christians who are coming from a very law heavy torah observant lifestyle and you've got the gentile christians who actually may be coming from a life where they were doing things or participating in things. And now they're simply recognizing, I am freed by Jesus Christ from those old ways, that old self. And there's a reason why the first

few chapters of Romans are so focused on this idea of law and works, grace and mercy. How do these work together? One of the hard parts of what we're trying to do today is that the division for Come Follow Me is right in the middle of Paul's doctrinal exposition on these ideas. One of the cool things about studying Paul, and we'll see this as we go through all the epistles through the rest of the year, is Paul's format is very predictable. He opens with the salutation. He then gives a thanksgiving to those that he's writing to. And then he has two parts in the body of every epistle. The first part is the doctrinal exposition. And then the second part is a hortatory or a, therefore, what are you supposed to do because of what you've just learned.

Chapter seven finds us right in the middle of that doctrinal discussion. And then once we get to chapter 12, we'll get to the point where it's now, what do you do with it? How do you live your life with it? As you study the epistles, if you can find those divisions, there's great resources that are available online

to be able to see how these epistles are broken down you can look and see okay here's the part where he's talking about doctrine that helps me to understand why i'm studying what i'm studying and then i'm getting to the point where he's saying this is what you're supposed to do with it and so you almost see a little bit of that that both are important you have to understand the doctrine you have to understand what to do and he's trying to balance it with both a group of people who are law heavy and a group of people that are maybe a little more grace heavy because they didn't know anything different except Jesus in their religious lives. Awesome. All right. I think you've set us up great here, Josh. Let's jump into chapter seven and see where Paul takes us.

Awesome. So we've made reference to this a moment ago. Paul's going to start. And one of the hard parts of studying Romans 7 through 16 is sometimes he uses code names for the people that he's talking about. And we can see that in verse one. So starting in Romans 7, 1, know ye not brethren.

Okay, who's this brethren that we're talking to? For I speak to them that know the law if you're not quite familiar with his audience you won't know that here he's talking to those who are jewish christians it's kind of like keeping track of a dialogue okay so he now is addressing jewish christians in rome and one of the other ways that we can tell that this is his focus is especially when we get to chapter eight and nine, he's going to use a ton of old Testament references. So he's focusing on now I'm going to speak specifically to you that know the

law and we need to read chapter seven through that lens. We're talking to Jewish Christians who have a loaded background of we're supposed to follow the law. The law is our way to salvation. We have to live the law. We have to do the things of the law. So there's our focus. His question in verse one, how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth. Now this question's fascinating to me because it emphasizes the temporal nature of the law. That when you're in life, during your life, the law is what is over you.

And Paul is then going to give kind of a scene that nobody really wants to have to face in verse two. For the woman which hath a husband is bound by law to her husband so long as he liveth. But if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband. We're getting this idea that I'm going to set up what it's like to be a Jewish Christian by talking about who your spouse is. Referring to the Jewish law here, the woman was free to

be able to marry again after her husband died. Now, Paul knows that this is a complicated situation because somebody is going to read that and say, are you telling me the law is dead? That's automatically what I thought is he's saying, and now the law is dead, so we can remarry into this new testament, this new law. Yeah. And imagine what that would be received as. Yeah. And imagine what that would be received as. Yeah. And say, whoa, wait a second. No, I grew up with the law. This is everything that I did in my life. Are you saying all of my years with the law were wasted? Paul then has to say, but I need to give some clarification. So he's not saying that the law is dead, but that it served a purpose. And that's where he's going to go with it in verse four of Romans chapter seven.

Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law. It's not the law that has died. It's the individual who has died as pertaining to the law. And that sounds a little convoluted because you're going, wait a second. How does that relate? It relates because he says this, by the body of Christ that ye should be married to another. So why are you leaving the law? You're not leaving the law because the law doesn't have a purpose and that it wasn't good. You're leaving the law because Christ has now asked you to, because he's given you a new law a new commandment and that that is the focus

of what your life should be now your focus is now the new law that Jesus Christ has given and because Christ came and died you're dead to the old law and you're now expected to follow the new one. Now, the reason I want to say it that way is because we get a lot of 2 Nephi 9 feelings in verse 7. So we jump down to Romans 7, 7, when he says this, What shall we say then? Is the law sin or is the law dead? God forbid. Now, the Joseph Smith translation helps us a lot here where he's, the Greek is more, may it be not,

or may it not be an emphatic statement of no, that's not how it should be. But I had not known sin, but by the law for, had I not known lust except the law had said, thou shalt not covet. So there in verse seven, we see that the law is connected to our knowledge

of what is right and what's wrong. And that's going to be reemphasized in verse 8. John, if you want to go ahead and read verse 8. Okay. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence, for without the law, sin was dead. Wow. John, good job on that, by the way. Concupiscence. Concupiscence. I don't know what that is. Say that 10 times in a row. But it wrought in Paul all manner of it, whatever it is. Okay. I get, Josh is going to tell us what it is. And I'm not going to do it from the English standpoint because I'm not great at King James English either, but I'll go to the Greek. The Greek here is tying it back to verse seven, where if I was translating it from the Greek, I'd say it had wrought in me all manner of covetousness.

So this word is talking about coveting or the coveting for without the law, sin was dead. And if you read this a few times, it gives you a little bit of a headache because you're going, okay, we're talking about law and sin and with the law, we have sin, but without the law, sin is dead. What does that mean? This is a wonderful place to go to second Nephi chapter nine, verses 25 and 26. In the book of Mormon, we're able to see Jacob's commentary that helps us better understand what Paul is trying to say to the Roman saints. So here in 2 Nephi 9, 25 and 26, we read this, wherefore he has given a law and where there is no law given, there is no punishment. And where there is no punishment, there is no condemnation. And where there is no condemnation, the mercies of the Holy One of Israel have claim upon them

because of the atonement for they are delivered by the power of him. What Paul's trying to say in these verses is that that Jacob told the ancient Nephites is if you don't know the law, you are not held accountable by it. Now for us as Latter-day Saints, we go, yes, that makes sense. That's awesome. But for a Jewish audience, that was hard to get their mind around because the Jews of the day believed that Torah was universally binding on everyone, regardless of who they were. God's law was to be bound on all people, regardless of whether they knew it or not. And understanding that opened my mind so much to what Paul is trying to do to get these saints to love one another. Because for the Jewish Christians, they'd been taught their whole lives that you have to follow the law.

There has to be a law that you have to follow line by line, word by word, walk by walk. And now that the Savior's coming and atoning for our sins, they're having a hard time wondering, well, what about what do I do? What is my responsibility then if the Savior's going to come? And that's where we go back to that carisse from chapter one is that we cannot repay what the Savior did. We can't make up a, we couldn't have done what he did, but we can walk faithfully. And when we know that's what we're supposed to do,

we have an elevated expectation to live it. That with the law, we know what sin is. And so the expectation is, is we have to live it that with the law we know what sin is and so the expectation is is we have to live sin free because we know what the law is but for those who don't know the law the atonement makes up that difference because you can't hold them accountable for something they didn't know it took me years to figure out that when we're talking about for those that don't know the law if i were to say that in today's context of tv shows it would sound like oh somebody who went to law school criminal law whatever we're talking about the law of moses when we say the law and then you use the phrase josh great synonym you're bound to the torah even if you don't know it so the torah is law the law the law it's the law of

moses so it was so helpful for me to realize that when we talk about the law and the prophets we're talking about parts of the old testament the law first five books and the prophets the prophetic books in the old testament so when jesus says things like on these two hang all the law and the prophets, he's talking about books. Yes. And one of the hard parts with Hebrew is the word for law generally is Torah. And then the word for the law, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy is Torah. So sometimes when I teach, I say, we're talking about law, little t, and that's the just law in general. And then, we're talking about law, little t, and that's just law in general. And then when we're talking about the law, capital T, that's Genesis through Deuteronomy.

But in there is, this is the way that one is supposed to walk. This is the way in which one is supposed to live. I can't even imagine what it would be like for some of these Jewish Christians to come into Christianity and say, now what? What do I do? What does my worship look like? How do I show my devotion to God? And so I have sympathy for them because they are trying to do the best with what they have. They don't have a leader that's there to guide them every step of the way. And they're saying, no, no, no, no. These things were good in my life. When I followed the law, look at these blessings that I received. The Gentile Christian is looking and saying, well,

so you're saying I have to follow your law, but in Christianity, that law is not there. And so you're getting that friction. And so that's why Paul is trying to specifically say to those Jewish Christians, you know the law, you lived the law, but the law is not what binds us to God any longer. It's the atonement of Jesus Christ. And so you need to be loving kindness. You need to show loving kindness and grace to those Gentile Christians who aren't coming from that same background. So, Josh, as we've read through these first eight verses of chapter seven, it can be really confusing. I'm using Bible Hub here trying to get other takes on this because it seems like you said,

it can get a little convoluted. So, would I be correct in saying that Paul is telling these Roman saints, the law basically told us what was right and what was wrong. It deline us what was right and what was wrong. It delineated what was right and what was wrong. And so it told us when we were sinning and when we were not sinning, Christ does more than that. He says, now we are verse six, we're serving in the newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter. So Christ has maybe changed why I don't sin, why I live the commandments. Yeah. And it's your motivation. And Hank, I want to make you feel better. You are not the only one that looks at these texts and goes,

wow, this is heavy. And the reason I can say that is, is one of the most extensive Joseph Smith translations that we have for the entire Bible is Romans chapter seven. And so I think maybe even helping and for our audience who's read and our listeners are looking through this and going, I'm never going to make sense of this. Joseph Smith is going to try and help us out with these very verses. And so being able to see that Joseph Smith saw this and said, Heavenly Father, I need to help the saints better understand this. Let's look at those same two verses that we just did, verses seven and eight, and how the Joseph Smith translation actually helps us. So here he says,

What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law, for had I not known lust, except the law had said, thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence, for without the law, sin was dead. So he kept the word. So he's gonna keep a lot of that,

but the explanation that's gonna follow, So going to the Joseph Smith translation, a lot of the first few verses are the same, but look at what Joseph Smith does to try and clarify this in verses 14, 15, and 16 of the Joseph Smith translation. So Joseph Smith translation of Romans seven, starting in verse 14, for we know that the commandment is spiritual, but when I was under the law, I was yet carnal, sold under sin. Verse 15, but now I am spiritual, for that which I am commanded to do, I do,

and that which I am commanded not to allow, I allow not. And then verse 16, for what I know is not right, I would not do for that which is sin I hate. And so the law was helpful because it helped us to be able to know what we should and shouldn't do. But it was carnal because going back to verse one, it was temporal. It was just how do we live in this life? How do I live my day-to-day life? When Jesus Christ came, he came to elevate our focus from a temporal focus to a spiritual focus. And now the laws are about spirituality. What am I doing to become? I think of Lindsay Robbins' amazing general conference talk,

what manner of men and women ought ye to be? We often have to-do lists, but we rarely have to become lists. That is what Paul is trying to say here, is the law was a to-do, but Jesus came to help us to be something better than what we are in our temporal state. Wow, that's really good. One of the things I feel like in the Book of Mormon, they never lost sight of what the law of Moses was. They always saw it as pointing to Christ. And it seems like, except for Sherem, right? He's the only one that argued otherwise.

But when you look at Abinadi's amazing sermon, his, tell him what I just told him, two verses at the end of Mosiah 16. Because he came and asked the wicked priest, what are you teaching? And they said, the law of Moses. Well, why don't you keep it? And he lectured him on what the law is. So this is verse 14 of Mosiah 16. Therefore, if you teach the law of Moses, also teach it is a shadow of those things which are to come. And then the next verse, teach them that redemption cometh through Christ the Lord,

who is the very eternal Father. Amen. And I just think, man, Abinadi just summed it up right there. This is what Robert Millett says, my favorite definition of the law of Moses. The law of Moses is a grand prophecy of Christ. And I think he's talking a lot about the sacrifices because we can see that in those. But then Abinadi gets it, that Christ hasn't come yet in Abinadi's time, but redemption cometh through Christ. So yeah, keep the law of Moses because we've been asked to, or strive to keep it, but never lose sight that redemption comes, salvation comes because of the atonement of Jesus Christ. Yeah. And John, I love that you've did that because there's two more things in chapter seven

that I think really will help us understand the audience that Paul is trying to write to. In verse nine, in Romans seven, Paul says something autobiographical, which sometimes if we read too quickly, we might miss. But in verse 9, he says, for I was alive without the law once, but when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. Some commentators on this verse think that maybe Paul's gusto and real fire to be faithful. We think about Paul's experiences as Saul where he's persecuting the saints. We can go to Philippians where Paul says, I was circumcised on the eighth day. It's kind of like somebody today may be saying, I was baptized at midnight on my eighth birthday. The very second I could be baptized, I was baptized.

That's how zealous I was. But some people wonder, did Paul maybe fall away from Judaism for a while? As Paul is getting ingrained in the world, was there a time that he felt alive without the law once? That he stepped away from it, but then when the commandment came, sin revived and I died. I realized that I needed to sacrifice the only thing I can sacrifice to God, which is my will to follow his commandments. And so maybe Paul is really sympathetic for those that are his Jewish Christian audience in these verses, because he said, I know what it's like to go without the law for a while and then to come back and to try and figure this out. And I think this is something for all of us that if there are times in our lives where we have lost commitment or maybe fallen away, that Paul is another example

of many, many people who have felt a revival to come back. It's never too late. It's never too late to say, no, I'm going to recommit. And the adversary tries to tell us, no, no, no. Like you've made your decision. It's over. But Paul here, I think is being vulnerable for a second and saying, no, there are times where I haven't been fully committed and I know what that did to me. And so I want to be understanding to you as well. Wow. I love the idea that obviously there are many off ramps of the covenant path, but there are also many on ramps. They're always open. And if you've gotten on, get back on.

And I love how my GPS never says, you idiot. My GPS just says recalculating. Go fix this and get back on. And I love that. So that's one point I didn't want us to miss here in chapter seven. The other point, which may come back to what John was saying a little bit ago about what the law of Moses was supposed to point forward to. Let's start in verse 24, because as Latter-day Saints, we might find something that this resonates with. Paul writes,

O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Paul is asking this question, who's going to redeem me from both physical and spiritual death? The law is temporal. It's only meant for my life, but what does that mean for me when this life is over and then verse 25 i thank god through jesus christ our lord so then with the mind i myself serve the law of god but with the flesh the law of sin and so he sets up and says i know the natural man is an enemy to god i know i'm wretched i know that I have a propensity to want to sin, but I myself am going to serve God. This is Paul's Joshua moment. As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. He's saying my body wants to serve sin,

but I'm going to serve this. Now I would be remissed for those who know me if I didn't recognize the Dead Sea Scrolls contribution to what this is helping us understand. Verse 25, this idea of the flesh and the law of sin, we get an idea of what this would have meant to a Jewish audience in one of the Dead Sea Scrolls called the community rule. So in the community rule, we have an idea of what Paul is talking about here in verse 25. So this is 1QS, column 11, lines 9 through 15. But they read,

As for me, to evil humanity and the counsel of perverse flesh do I belong. My transgressions, evils, sins, and corrupt heart belong to the counsel of wormy rot and those who walk in darkness. Surely a man's way is not his own. Neither can any person firm his own step. Surely justification is of God. By his power is the way made perfect. All that shall be, he foreknows.

All that is, his plans establish. Apart from him is nothing done. As for me, if I stumble, God's loving kindness forever shall save me. If through sin of the flesh I fall, my justification will be by the righteousness of God, which endures for all time. Though my affliction break out, he shall draw my soul back from the pit and firm my step on the way.

Through his love, he has brought me near. By his loving kindness shall he provide my justification? I don't know about you, but to me, that sounds like scripture. That is again, the community rule that was written sometime between 150 BC. So we're talking 150 or a hundred years. I wonder if Paul has a text like that in mind, because he talks about I'm wretched and I have this, but God will justify me. And he's then going to say, it's not by me that this is justified.

God can't just forgive sin. He had to send his only begotten son to atone for us. These Jewish texts are saying, well, God's going to do this. It's in his plan. But what was his plan? His plan was to send Jesus Christ to suffer, bleed and die and be resurrected so that we could find that justification. Great stuff. I really like where we went. You know, when you read this and you hear Paul just saying, oh, I know that to do the right thing. And then I don't. I mean, I don't think we can assume too much that he was always messing up. You know what I mean?

Because when I read a wretched man that I am from Nephi, I'm like, I would like to be that wretched. Yeah, sure. I'd also like to be large in stature, but that ain't happening. So I wonder if we can overthink that as he talks about wrestling with the flesh, because we all do, we mess up, but I don't think it was a really bad and consistent habit of messing up. Let me read something that Dr. Robert L. Millett, a guest on the program we've had, his book called Becoming New, it's a commentary on Paul. and this is what he says on page 38. The title of this paragraph is Paul Before and After Christ.

Chapter 7 of Romans has resulted in more misunderstanding about Paul and about the human race in general than almost any other chapter of Scripture. A cursory reading will cause most persons unfamiliar with the Pauline epistles to shake their heads and wonder how in the world the Apostle Paul managed to garner so much attention through the years, as well as how he could possibly have been so admired and respected by Christians through the centuries. As it reads in the King James Version, or for that matter, most any other translation, we see poor old pitiful Paul, a weak, simpering, and pathetic excuse of a man whose life is completely out of control, a man who never does what he should do and always seems to be doing what he shouldn't. And you can kind of get that impression for some of those verses. Next paragraph. My late colleague

Robert J. Matthews wrote, quote, as rendered in the KJV, Paul is sinful, carnal, and wicked even after years in the apostleship and knows not how to do good or even what is good. The JST rewords the passage in such a way as to show the difference between Paul's life for under the law of Moses and his life after he found and obeyed the gospel of Christ. In the Joseph Smith translation, Paul explains that when he was living under the law of Moses, he was carnal, but through the gospel, including receiving its covenants and ordinances, he has become spiritual. Most important, the Joseph Smith translation states that it is only in Christ that he learned how to be a good man, and that through the assistance of Christ, Paul subdues the sin within him.

So good. and that through the assistance of christ paul subdues the sin within him so good i think that works really well right after reading the jst and showing our little struggle of being able to really make heads or tails out of what's going on as i was looking at this i noticed that footnote 5a in chapter 7 says jst romans 7 5 through 27 appendix and then I know this footnote 15a JST Romans 7 it's like no really go to the JST it's in there twice telling us to read the same verses it's like no really you got to see this so that's an important addition yeah some people might not even know where to find that Joseph Smith translation. It's back. If you're your old paper copy, it's back after the Bible dictionary before the maps. I've had students before thought, I've never even seen this. Speaking of that JST, John, I think everyone should go read this and listen to these last two verses. It ends chapter seven in more of a positive tone than it ends in the KJV.

It's now 26. He's added a couple of verses here. And if I subdue not the sin which is in me, but with the flesh serve the laws of sin, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord that so with the mind I myself serve the law of God. It's just a little bit of a change that makes, I think, a significant difference. Pete Well, that's great. There's a verse there that helped me a lot when I was a single adult. I fulfilled all my eligibility as a young single adult and went into single adult. The last half of verse 18, for to will is present with me. I want to do the right thing, but how to perform that which is good, I find not.

I just think that's, I know what I'm supposed to do, but I'm incompetent sometimes at doing what I'm supposed to do. I thought that was helpful. To will, I want to do it. How to do it, I don't know yet. Yeah, it's almost like he's saying the desire to do good is right there, but I just don't have the ability right now. Yeah.

This is so good because, again, coming back to the audience, Paul's coming down hard and trying to correct years and years of training. And so to be able to say, I know your hearts. I know that you're good people. I've heard nothing but good about you. Please do not take this as me simply saying you're wretched. I'm the wretched one, but I know your hearts that you want to do this just like me. And so please, please, please know that I'm writing.

And it's so hard in that medium. Paul couldn't just jump on the internet, couldn't just go on FaceTime or anything like that to talk to these people. He's got to convey everything in writing. Any chance that we can see where he's trying to say, hey, I'm reassuring you. I'm like you. I know this. I've been where you are. I'm here to support you. It's so important because he's trying to build unity in what seems to be an impossible situation. Yeah. And it's really nice to see a leader do that. I think that's really nice to see a leader be a little vulnerable in saying, hey, I haven't always done the right things. That's same with parenting. With Nephi, oh, wretched man that I am. That's

one of his greatest moments. You wouldn't say to Nephi, come on, Nephi, don't have low self-esteem. I mean, no, he was in a great place right there. And then he goes on with, but I know in whom I have trusted. My God hath been my support and gives that psalm of Nephi in 2 Nephi 4. So I'm with you, Hank. I am glad Nephi said, oh wretched man that i am because it makes us all go we're gonna have moments where we're like but then we know in who we have trusted and we we move forward good stuff speaking of moving forward josh what do you want to do next

we've now kind of set the tone with this idea of the law is no longer binding upon Christians. And now when we get to chapter eight, I've actually written in my scriptures under chapter eight, life is empowered by the Holy Spirit. And so as we're going through kind of a theme of the next part of this chapter is how does the spirit then empower our lives? Because the question Paul is, again, trying to project what questions people are going to ask when they're reading this epistle, they're going to get to the end of this and ask, okay, so what am I supposed to do then?

If I'm not supposed to follow the law, what is the expectation that I'm supposed to have? And so here comes chapter eight. And again, these divisions are arbitrary. They weren't in the original manuscripts. So this is just a continuation of the thought, but chapter eight, he says, there is therefore now no condemnation to them, which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. So this is a little bit of a rebuke to those Jewish Christians.

There is no condemnation to those Gentile Christians who aren't following the law. Know that that's the case. They're walking after the spirit. Well, what does that look like? Verse two, for the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. So it's the fact that Jesus Christ has given the law of the spirit of life. What is it that the spirit, that promised spirit that came on the day of Pentecost, what is it teaching us to do? Are we following it?

In the back of my mind, I will never forget President Nelson's statement. In a coming day, it will be impossible to survive spiritually without the guiding and directing help of the spirit. That is what Paul's trying to say is, is now your expectation is you are to live by the spirit. And there are laws that the spirit is going to dictate. And sometimes it's just going to be you and the spirit that knows what that law looks like, but it's going to be there and you need

to follow it. And so we need to be empowered to live according to the spirit and the spirit is what's going to guide and direct us. Interestingly enough, the word there is penuma in Greek, which is the same word that we see in the old Testament as the spirit that is over the earth during creation. And so tying that back to the spirit of life, the breath of life that God gives to Adam and Eve when they're created, that's the very essence of life. It's supposed to be directed by the spirit. And to give commentary to that, one of my favorite talks that was ever given by Sister Nelson. So this is January 2017, her discussion, love and marriage.

And so she goes through and I use this with my seminary students all the time when I teach intimacy because she teaches it so well. So the word here that spirit of life is the Greek word penuma that is used throughout the Old Testament Greek translation as the spirit of life. It's the spirit that's over the creation in Genesis 1-2. It's connected to this idea of the breath of life that's given to Adam and Eve in the creation. It's what was supposed to dictate their lives. And as I read this verse, I see Paul trying to say, you need to live in a way that the spirit is always present. And whenever I think of this, I can't help but want to teach Sister Wendy Nelson's

discussion on the importance of the Holy Ghost. She's talking about intimacy, but she will broaden it out to everyone in life. She goes, for true marital intimacy, the Holy Ghost needs to be involved. It is simply not possible to kind of have the intimate experiences outside of marriage that you can have within because the spirit will not be present. Elder Parley P. Pratt taught that the Holy Ghost has the ability to increase, enlarge, expand, and purify all the natural passions and affections. Just imagine, he can purify your feelings. Therefore, anything that invites the spirit into your life and into the life of your spouse and your marriage will increase your ability to experience marital intimacy. It really is as simple and as profound as that. On the other hand, anything that offends the spirit will decrease your ability to be one with your spouse.

Things such as anger, lust, unforgiveness, contention, immorality, and unrepented sin will reduce your attempt for marital intimacy to be something that is nothing more than a sexual experience. Now, while Sister Nelson is putting that within the realms of marital intimacy, I think we can connect it to Paul that it's anything in our lives. If there is anything we're doing in our lives or we're trying to do without the Spirit, it's not going to be as successful as if we try to do it with the spirit. And a lot of what we're going to read in chapter eight is all about receiving that spirit. How do we avoid the things that will drive the spirit away? And how do we accept and receive the spirit into our lives and live after that,

after the direction that we receive from? The reason that the spirit can direct us, verse three, and again, we cannot divorce ourselves from this eternal and essential truth. Verse three in chapter eight of Romans, for what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh. So why can we live after the spirit? Why can the spirit quicken our lives and help us? It's through the atonement of Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost is not doing anything independent of the Savior's atoning sacrifice. It's amplifying it. And so our lives should be lived in a way

in which the Spirit is guiding and directing us to be able to do many great things. And a great summary of this would be verse six, which reads a little bit differently than what we see later in the book of Mormon. But Romans 8, six, for to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. And so we do have that cross-reference in the book of Mormon

where it's to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life eternal. So, we get a little bit of a difference in what Paul is writing here, but that's the whole essence of what Paul is trying to get these Jewish Christian and Gentile Christians to understand is you need to be spiritually minded. You need to have your eye set on the glory of God rather than focusing just on worldly and temporal things. I loved what you said about having the Spirit and the Holy Ghost in guiding us and the atonement of Jesus Christ are being connected. And this is what Brigham Young said, this is Journal of Discourses, volume 12, 104. There is no doubt if a person lives according

to the revelations given to god's people he may have the spirit of the lord to signify to him his will and to guide and to direct him in the discharge of his duties in his temporal as well as his spiritual exercises i am satisfied however that in this respect we live far beneath our privileges. So good. So when you're talking about being spiritually minded, you mean the Holy Ghost can really help us with everything we have to do? Yeah, would love to.

And isn't that what happened to the sacrament table? We can always have his spirit to be with us. But I love how Greg Muehling says we're living beneath our privileges, which makes me want to, I got to step it up. I got to be more spiritually minded like Paul Sink here. Excellent. I really liked this discussion because if you two are anything like me, I know when I've lost the spirit and that hopefully doesn't happen often, but I can see that to be carnally minded or to be driven by your emotions or by your appetites and passions is not going to end well. It never ends well. But if you're guided by the spirit and you're in control of those things, leads to life and peace.

And he says the carnal mind is enmity against God in verse 7, which sounds a lot like King Benjamin. A natural man is an enemy to God because it hurts God's children. Yeah. And Hank, I think one of the other steps that we can move that discussion to is that keep in mind our context. There's contention between Jewish Christians and Gentile Christians, and it's because they are being carnally minded. They're focused right here and now. We see this in the news. We see this in discussions of our world today is pretty divided. Why not turn to Paul's words and say, okay, we may be divided over different issues. We may be divided over different questions, but Jesus Christ can unify us just like he unified them.

We can find that. And one of those first steps is for myself to look introspectively and say that I am being carnally minded about this subject and I can become better. I love what Paul says in verse nine of Romans eight, but ye are not in the flesh. You're holy ones, you're set apart, you're saints, but in the spirit. And if so, be that the flesh you're holy ones you're set apart you're saints but in the spirit and if so be that the spirit of God dwell in you now if any man have not the spirit of Christ he

is none of his so if we are acting outside of that spirit we're not acting for Christ but verse 10 and if Christ be in you the body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. And so we're seeing this emphasis that we need to be those who seek to welcome the spirit and to especially welcome the savior into our lives. And what are his great commandments? Love God, love our neighbor. And that's what overcomes this carnality that is evident in all of us. It's really fun to see it in the context of Paul trying to get these groups together. I'm so glad you're doing that because it's giving me a lot of, oh, type of, oh, I get it. The connection between the Holy Ghost and the atonement, I don't think is something that's as understood among church members as it could be. Then Elder Henry B. Eyring said, this is a BYU speech given way back in 1989.

Do you guys remember the 1900s? I was there, I bet. Were you? Yeah, you probably were. He says, you can invite the Holy Ghost companionship in your life, and you can know when he is there and when he withdraws. And this is the part that really is profound to me. And when he is your companion, you can have confidence the atonement is working in your life. That's something that for a long time, I didn't connect to the Holy Ghost companionship is that's an indication that the Savior's atonement is

changing your nature, as Paul would say here, changing you from carnally minded to spiritually minded. So with all of this discussion about receiving the spirit and trying to be able to say that's the new rallying direction that we're going to receive. I love what Paul is going to do here in verses 15, 16 and 17 of Romans 8. He starts for you have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear. Now look at how he's playing the spirit of life and of peace and of joy that comes from God with the spirit of bondage and fear that comes from the adversary. He's really setting up this dichotomy, but he then says, but ye have received the spirit of adoption whereby we cry Abba father. Paul is trying to tell these Christian saints in Rome, when you accepted Christ, you were adopted into a family that is together.

And while you might have some quarrels with your siblings that have a little bit different views than you do, we are family and we have the same God. And so that spirit beareth witness in verse 16 with our spirit, and we are children of God. So Paul is trying to emphasize what the true identity is of these Christians. It doesn't matter if you're Gentile Christian, it doesn't matter if you're a Jewish Christian, you are a Christian. Drop the precedent, drop for whoever you were before and focus on this. In our day, President Nelson is trying to get us to do the same. What is our identity? First and foremost, it's our divine identity as children of God, children of the covenant, that we are individuals

who have put God first. And so being able to recognize that Paul is saying the same thing about identity, that President Nelson is saying about identity today shows that we have a connection with these ancient saints, but we've been adopted by God and we are his children and we have his spirit with us. We're joint heirs. We're children of God. We are a family. That seems to be something that he's saying. You've got to unite to these Roman saints. And ultimately, isn't that the purpose of Zion? I sometimes get frustrated with my students when we talk about the second coming and they look at me and say,

brother Mattson, how bad does the world have to get before Jesus comes back? And I turn that around and say, can I ask you a question? How good do we need to get before Jesus comes back? And one of those things is to understand our identity and understand that we're all in this together, that we as saints need to join arm in arm and build the kingdom in preparation

for that, because it's by doing that, verse 17, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. And if it so be that we suffer with him him that we may be also glorified together. If we want the king to come, we better build the kingdom for him to come too. Please join us for part two of this podcast.