Please turn to Romans 16. Soon we’ll be starting a series through Acts that’ll take us a while. As I prepare for that I want to prepare you for that series through various messages:
Acts is about the first years of the Spirit forming the Church. Today’s passage is simply a bunch of hellos from Paul to individuals in the Church, the church in Rome. What could we possibly do with this? Well, here we are given not the logic of Christianity but a portrait of Christianity. We can observe and mull over and then take the measurement of ourselves: how close are we to the way the Christian life is portrayed in this passage? Warning: this will be meandering. And it goes a little long. If I sense defeater body language I’ll leave off the last point.
16 I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a servant of the church at Cenchreae, 2 that you may welcome her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints, and help her in whatever she may need from you, for she has been a patron of many and of myself as well.
3 Greet Prisca and Aquila, my fellow workers in Christ Jesus,4 who risked their necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks but all the churches of the Gentiles give thanks as well.5 Greet also the church in their house. Greet my beloved Epaenetus, who was the first convert to Christ in Asia. 6 Greet Mary, who has worked hard for you. 7 Greet Andronicus and Junia, my kinsmen and my fellow prisoners. They are well known to the apostles, and they were in Christ before me.8 Greet Ampliatus, my beloved in the Lord. 9 Greet Urbanus, our fellow worker in Christ, and my beloved Stachys. 10 Greet Apelles, who is approved in Christ. Greet those who belong to the family of Aristobulus. 11 Greet my kinsman Herodion. Greet those in the Lord who belong to the family of Narcissus.12 Greet those workers in the Lord, Tryphaena and Tryphosa. Greet the beloved Persis, who has worked hard in the Lord.13 Greet Rufus, chosen in the Lord; also his mother, who has been a mother to me as well. 14 Greet Asyncritus, Phlegon, Hermes, Patrobas, Hermas, and the brothers who are with them. 15 Greet Philologus, Julia, Nereus and his sister, and Olympas, and all the saints who are with them. 16 Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ greet you.
We wish we could get behind some of the details in this list of names. Paul refers to situations/happenings that are not recorded in the biblical record. We don’t know who most of these people are. Frankly, we’re not even sure they’re all people. When I read in v. 9: greet…my beloved Stachys, my first thought was that Stachys might be a dog of Urbanus’ – a dog with a big personality that Paul had come across in his travels and made a big impression on him. Who’s to say – when I was in college I wrote letters to my boxer, Storm.
Even though we don’t know a lot, these sixteen verses give us a window into the heart of church life. What do we see?
Greeting was obviously important to Paul.
If our whole experience with the church consists of arriving one minute before the service starts, then afterward heading out the door with a few nods toward people we’ve seen in previous weeks. . . we’re going to feel a bit baffled at this passage.
Do you remember the line from the theme song of Cheers – where everybody knows your name? That’s how church is supposed to be. A church is a company in which people know and are known, their names are remembered. Many times, we don’t just know the names of the people in the church, we know their family member’s names.
The church is not a theater where strangers intersect for a moment to watch the spectacle on stage and then, still strangers, hustle back out to their real life, hopefully with a little inspiring takeaway. However, there is a large segment of Christendom that thinks of church pretty much like that.
Paul not only greets individuals within the church, he directs the church to greet one another. And making eye contact or a curt nod doesn’t do the trick. He says, with a holy kiss.
I know that middle easterners, even men, don’t shy away from kissing. But perhaps we are allowed to adjust the command to our culture and accept the hug or the meaningful handshake as good enough.
But through example and precept, we are urged to the practice of greeting people. I grew up in the church. And I remember specifically on Sunday nights that as we sat in the pews the assistant pastor would move from family to family, from individual to individual, and greet them.
Both my father-in-law Klaus and my brother-in-law Sven have told me of the German workplace custom of arriving to work and the first order of business is to go around the room and greet every person. That’s a Christian leftover, if you ask me.
Greeting is healthy, partly because it lets off some suspicion. Here’s what happens: when we’re away from each other, we think of each other, and sometimes our thoughts tend toward exaggeration and caricature, and so if we have an ill thought of someone it doesn’t take long before we assume that they’re hopelessly mistaken or your classic unthinking liberal or untight conservative or they hate us etc. The voices in our head are biting and sarcastic and hateful, and it’s easy – in our minds – while away from them to put those words in the mouths of Christians. But then I show up, and you show up, and we move in for the hug, and the beard scrapes the cheek or the webs of our hands burrow into each other…and much of that suspicion dispels in the air.
The Church is a Family
Folks, we don’t gather just to grab information or inspiration. The church isn’t night school, where you don’t know anyone but that’s ok because you’ll get a degree. It’s not a educational clearing house. It’s not a hour of chicken soup of the soul. We are a family. Paul refers to “our sister,” and a nameless woman who’s been a mother to him.
Imagine all the personal history bound up in those word: she has been a mother to me. Paul went through his share of physical assaults. He had constant pressure on him – what was the messenger of Satan he referred to? – perhaps a besetting sin. Perhaps demonic voices turned up. Perhaps something physical. But he was regularly spiritually assaulted, he says cast down, perplexed, etc.
But in his life, there was at least one reliable balm, a woman who was a surrogate mother. What did she do? Bandage literal wounds? Was this a woman to whom he could vent his frustrations knowing that the information wouldn’t be used maliciously? Did she send him encouraging notes? Was her house a place where he could hang out without any pressure to sound deep or be on mission? Did she, without any to-do, provide him a neat chamber where he could study and pray? Did she not talk all spiritual and stuff? My guess would be yes.
The church advances by helpful warm familial relationships. Christ has made us brothers and sisters. Practice brotherly kindness.
And it doesn’t have to be in every exchange, but occasionally you can let out an ‘I love you.’ Look at the number of times in this small section Paul says “my beloved.”
Occasionally, let your brothers and sisters in the Lord know that you love them. For that matter, often tell your wife that. Tell your kids, perhaps especially your adult kids, whenever you’re getting off the phone with them, I love you.
Knowing. Friendship. Love. Is that your church experience? Is that your experience in a Christian home?
Keep up with the Church from afar
One fact we should face: it takes effort to stay up with the Church when you’re away from them. That’s another thing that the Apostle exemplifies for us today: it’s worth the effort. We have to remember that Paul hadn’t visited the Roman church, and yet he knew at least 26 of them by name. Most of these must have been folks that Paul had come across in his travels across Asia Minor and Turkey, and who had eventually landed in Rome. Paul, if we text you, will you pledge to return our texts?
We might be tempted to think of Paul as a logic churning academic or a mystic with a forbidding persona who managed a grim upturn of the lips when he was around people. But not so. Jesus is a lover of people and he turns his people into lovers of people. But we’re not about riding big emotions. It takes work to remember people’s names, to keep track of people, to stay up with them after they’ve moved out of your neighborhood.
I have homework for you from this sermon. Your assignment is to this week contact someone who once was a part of this congregation. Secondly, contact an old church member of yours from another congregation. Thirdly, contact an out-of-state relative. In your exchange, use the word “love.”
Houses – think it through
Ok, we’re still trying to enter the mood of this passage, grasp the sub-text. You probably noticed an interesting phrase in v. 5: greet the church in their house. The earliest church gathered in houses. From reading history it would seem that, as in many cities across the world, there were a few house churches in Rome… and they would occasionally come together for the Communion. From the beginning of the church there wasn’t a sharp division between home life and church life. For some, the place of living was also the place of gathering to worship. “Day by day…breaking bread in their homes,” Luke records the earliest church doing.
Yes, house churches were a practical necessity – there was no other place Christians could have worshiped. But I have to see significance in this, God’s plan.
Gathering in homes emphasizes that following Christ is supposed to intrude into and affect our everyday routines; that we can’t erect a wall in front of our private space where the commands of Christ can’t enter. In the Old Covenant there was a place where heaven and earth would intersect, the Temple. Under the new covenant the Temple – that intersection of earth and heaven – is the Church… down to the details of the believer’s body, and so everything – finances, speaking, nap-taking, lawn-mowing, husband-wife interactions, work, presentation – is set apart and dedicated to God.
Of course, this passage isn’t suggesting that every person’s home was a gathering place for believers. But some were. And when Paul and John at different times exhorts the church to hospitality, the requirement is that within the church there be at least a strain of the custom of opening up the home. Is God calling you to this ministry? If you do, do that well. Include a prayer before departing.
One last thing about the church being in a house: God didn’t command the early church to build buildings. Not that there’s anything wrong with a church building; in fact, there are many advantages. But don’t forget there’s a built-in simplicity at the core of the church, which allows fluidity – the church can flourish in expensive cities, under restricted governments… You name the difficult condition, we can persist in “devot[ing] ourselves to “the apostle’s teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.” We could also add to these a leadership that oversees they’re taking place. Don’t allow the apparatus of church – lawn care, aesthetics, even particular liturgy – take you away from the kernels of simply gathering, fellowship, doctrine, prayer.
Think about Phoebe
Let’s quickly look a little more closely at a couple of the mentions here. The first one, Phoebe, is coming over to Rome from Cenchreae, which was a port of the city of Corinth. Especially from v. 23, we perceive that Paul wrote this letter from Corinth. So it appears that Phoebe is conveying the letter to the Roman church from Corinth to Rome.
Since the Roman church won’t have met her before, according to the current custom Paul sends some words of commendation – you can trust Phoebe. Not only does he name her as “our sister,” he goes on to call her a servant – the Greek word is deacon – of the church at Cenchreae. Was Phoebe occupying the role of a deacon as we know it? At the time of writing, was that role spelled out as completely as it was in Paul’s letter to Timothy? We simply can’t say for sure.
But what we can say is that Phoebe was a servant to the church. Paul instructs the Roman church to welcome her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints and help her in whatever she may need from you. There’s the suggestion that she has something to do in Rome, perhaps she has a business concern there?
Moreover, when Paul says that she’s been a patron of many and of myself as well, it appears that she’s a woman of some means, and that she’s used her wealth to benefit the church and the advance of the gospel. Good stuff.
Don’t you enjoy imagining this good, wealthy, rightly ordered woman on the deck of a ship on the high sea, perhaps leaning over the railing, with a sheaf of papers somewhere on her person, a letter that would alter the legal and intellectual and spiritual landscape of the world? Samuel Coleridge, the English poet, called Romans “the profoundest work in existence.” The modern-day theologian Gordon Fee said, “This letter is arguably the most influential book in Christian history, perhaps in the history of Western civilization.” Calvin said about Romans: “When anyone understands this epistle, he has a sure road open for him to the understanding of the whole Scriptures.” And it’s all with the woman on the Ionian Sea!
There’s a lesson here: In seemingly ordinary scenes, as mundane as travel from point a to point b, God might very well be at work, his right hand stretched out preparing to save. Don’t look for signs of sensationalism, just be faithful!
Think about Prisca and Aquila
Prisca and Aquila are another interesting mention. Paul had first ran into this wife and husband (or were they sister/brother) in Corinth while they were exiled from Rome. One could easily assume they were already believers when they had to leave Rome. Like Paul, they were tentmakers – so Paul immediately hit it off with them. So much so that they left Corinth with Paul and traveled with him to Ephesus.
Turn to Acts 18: 24 to read what happened there:
24 Now a Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, came to Ephesus. He was an eloquent man, competent in the Scriptures. 25 He had been instructed in the way of the Lord. And being fervent in spirit, he spoke and taught accurately the things concerning Jesus, though he knew only the baptism of John. 26 He began to speak boldly in the synagogue, but when Priscilla and Aquila heard him, they took him aside and explained to him the way of God more accurately. 27 And when he wished to cross to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples to welcome him. When he arrived, he greatly helped those who through grace had believed, 28 for he powerfully refuted the Jews in public, showing by the Scriptures that the Christ was Jesus.
So these tentmakers set straight the intellectual, Apollos – evidently Prisca and Aquilla were mature believers. Another indication of that maturity – Paul also says they had risked their necks for him – we don’t know when that happened . . . perhaps in Ephesus. They didn’t count their lives dear to themselves – serving God was worth the risks.
Commentators wonder why Prisca’s name is mentioned first – especially back then these sequences were thought through, and meaningful.
Let’s take a step back for a second: God has appointed three structures through which he governs this world: government, church, and family. In two out of the three, he has clearly said that males are to lead… Regarding the church gathering, Paul says, “I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man.” He explains that directive with reasons which transparently are not culturally bound despite what many modern interpreters want to say.
In another place, wives are told to submit to their own husbands.
Today these directives aren’t popular and often not even received – certainly not by western society and even by much of the church. Even those increasingly rare places where the church does receive them, it’s often with a lot of qualifying and apology.
However, as I grow older, I’m more impatient with myself and others talking out of both sides of their mouth. So let me say it clearly: Husbands are the leaders of their homes. Women elders and preachers aren’t permitted by the Apostles, which means our Lord Jesus Christ doesn’t permit them.
And yet… even in standing athwart the truth and being unembarrassedly counter-culture, let’s not take these ideas and run with them further than the Scripture does. I am certainly open to the idea that Prisca is mentioned first because she was the dominant personality and perhaps the superior theologian.
When I was young, I often heard my parents referred to as Diane and Clovis. From a distance, and even as you drew closer, one would conclude that my mom was the real leader of the home. She’s always had strong opinions, willing to express them, she was on the move, was willing to stand up to people.
On the other hand, my dad, though no milk toast, wasn’t brazen, nor domineering. And he was willing, even glad, to have my mom make many (most?) of the decisions. We moved houses all the time, and everyone knew it was because my mom had overcome the decorating and landscaping challenges there and was looking for new lands to conquer.
A leader can decide that there are very few places where he is going to draw a line in the sand and insist… And a leader can be ok with in several moments not appearing the leader. I always go back to James and John coming up to Jesus and saying…to HIM!… we want you do to whatever we ask of you. A real leader can absorb a lot of cheekiness from those he’s leading.
So, in a good Christian marriage, the wife can be the one who often spearheads various endeavors. Even while the husband is always the ultimate leader.
Moreover, preventing women from ruling in the church and preaching to the assembly is not necessarily a slight on their theological acumen. Luke is careful to say that Prisca and Aquila (again in this passage she’s mentioned first) both set Apollos straight. I can imagine that Prisca was the more theologically competent and articulate. I can imagine that Aquila sat by while she did most of the talking. Perhaps he occasionally said, “Yes, hmm, good point, dear.”
I grew up in a house with a lot of theological volumes, read almost exclusively by my mom. My brothers and I still often tease my mom because she reads books with titles like “The Banality of Nihilism.”
Much of my theology I learned from my mom. I remember when I was a senior in high school my mom directed me to Francis Schaeffer, the eccentric philosopher-theologian. When I expressed that I found the writing too difficult, she scoffed at me.
I point out this about Prisca and Aquila, and I could go further and highlight the other mentions of women in this passage, and we’ll observe the point a few times in Acts… to assert that the charge that Paul, or even Christianity, are misogynistic, prejudiced against women, is just simply not true. In the life of the church, there is plenty of opportunity for women – not simply to bake brownies and sow coats for the missionaries – but to exercise their intellect, to do gospel work. So, preach to the covenanted assembly? – no, not at all. Become a theologian and religious scholar, churning out one book after another? – Sister, sure, why not?
See Christ
I’ll close by foregrounding what is constantly in the background of this passage: Christ. Twelve times he’s mentioned. He’s behind all who Paul knows in Rome; the love that Paul sends is sourced in Him; He has brought all these persons together to love and to work.
There has been growing talk of an epidemic of loneliness, especially in the western, developed world. The answer to forlornness is not to simply get around people, even making your way to the center of a jovial crowd. “Even in laughter the heart may ache; and joy may end in sorrow.”
The answer to loneliness is paradoxical: to follow Christ so vigorously that your loyalty to him leaves far behind all other earthly loyalties. To order your loves so that no one comes even close to your love for Christ. Believe and be baptized. In this enterprise of complete fealty to Christ, something will occur: you’ll have gained lands and houses and mothers and brothers and sisters a thousand time over. God sets the solitary into families. He’ll give you a people to care for. Wherever you travel, the worldwide church will welcome you and bring you into their houses. They’ll give you a place to stay.
And in Christ, not just places and people; more abstractly, you’re given direction for your life. And plenty of work, as much as you want. And the sense, the growing sense, of having been appointed for this time and this place. Challenges and tests that will grow you as a human.
AMEN
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