Romans 10:14-15 and Missions

Is it talking about missions?

Posted Monday, May 07, 2007 by Charlie Trimm
Categories: New Testament; Missions

Our church had a missions conference recently and the missions committee asked me to preach on a section that is commonly used for missions: Romans 10:14-15. The theme was to be God’s love for the least reached people of the world since the conference was focusing on the 10/40 window. I was more than happy to take up this topic, but as I began my study I quickly came across a problem: Paul is not talking about missions. So could I still use this section for missions?

Romans 9-11 answers a central question that could arise in response to Romans 1-8. The question is this: If God was not faithful to his promises to Israel in the past, will he be faithful to these promises that he has just given to us (as recorded in Romans 1-8)? In other words: Is God trustworthy? The overwhelming answer Paul gives in Romans 9-11, before he moves to the more practical issues of 12-16, is “Yes!” He tells of his passionate love for Israel and the idea of sovereignty and the remnant in chapter 9. Then at the tail end of 9 and the beginning of chapter 10 he tells why Israel has rejected God: they have tried to get to God by means of law instead of by faith. Paul, however, proceeds to give them the benefit of a doubt. Maybe there were extenuating circumstances. Maybe they did not hear? Maybe no one told them? Maybe they did not have anyone sent to them? But with each of these reasons, Paul says that they are not valid: He told them, he was sent to them, but they still rejected God. The reason, given later, is that they were simply obstinate. Finally, in chapter 11 Paul gives the example of the olive tree and tells how God has put Israel to the side for the moment but will return to Israel again in the future.

Therefore, Paul is not holding a missions conference using Romans 10:14-15. Can we use it legitimately today this way? I think that we can, even though this was the not the original intention. These verses reflect a general truth that Paul brings in to support his argument about Israel: they have no excuse. The common excuses do not work for them. Therefore, Paul views these verses as self-evidently true. He is not trying to prove them to be true, he is simply quoting them to support his argument and assumes his readers will agree with him that they are true. So Romans 10:14-15 do show that these thoughts are supported as true by Paul, and we can apply the general truth of them to other contexts, such as worldwide missions. I do not think that Paul would have a problem with the way that we use these verses.

All that being said, I do wonder how helpful these verses are for our view of missions. It is nice to have a text that spells it out for us. But do we really need a text to tell us that people have to know the gospel before they believe? It seems rather self-evident to me, and I think that it appeared self-evident to Paul as well since he used it assuming that his readers would agree with him on this point. I know that there is a debate about inclusivism, and these verses could help if Paul was talking about that, but since he is not discussing that issue I am not sure that these verses provide a solid answer to that question.

Wednesday, May 09, 2007 10:48 AM

Brian wrote:

Charlie,
I think I understand your question. Paul is declaring Israel to be without any excuse for unbelief, and Romans 10:14-15 represents one of the excuses they offer.

But how are they to call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!”
Romans 10:14-15

Paul goes on to write that this excuse doesn’t apply to Israel since they heard from both Moses and Isaiah. And “Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.” (10:18).

But he lets the excuse stand. So can we can conclude that even though this excuse doesn’t work for Israel, it may be a valid excuse for another people?

But does Paul allow the excuse to stand for anyone?

“They” in verses 14-18 seems to refer to “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” in verse 13. And would this mean that no one may use “not hearing” as an excuse?

Maybe we need to have a different emphasis in our call to missions. Start with a differnet premise: that everyone has heard. The gospel is truly available to them. Therefore the problem that people have is that they don’t comprehend that this is a message of salvation to them. So we are sending missionaries to help people understand the message of salvation. This is different than sending missionaries to people to bring them a new message.

Wednesday, May 09, 2007 11:58 AM

Sam wrote: an attempt to clarify with Brian

Brian, I think I like your approach in the last paragraph...but to clarify...

You say, "The gospel is truly available to them." Do you mean that every people group has heard the gospel? Or do you mean that God has provided general revelation (non-specific to the issue of salvation through the sacrifice of Christ), and the task of the missionary is to start by explaining this general revelation, and then move on to the special revelation regarding the Messiah?