Romans 3:21 is the turning point, the thing that changes everything, where Paul introduces us to …

• God’s Declaration – Justification
• God’s Goal – Redemption
• God’s Means – Propitiation

In Romans 3:1-20 Paul is bringing the first section of his letter to a close, asking a series of rhetorical questions to drive home the point that we have fundamentally missed the point of the Law.

no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin

In Romans 2:17-29 Paul makes a personal challenge to those resting on their inherited advantages and reminds them that,

• Keeping the Law is an inward thing, not an ourward
• Keeping the Law requires an outward power, not an inward resolve
• Keeping the Law is for God’s praise, not people’s

Friday 29th November will see the House of Common giving a second reading to a bill intended to legalise assisted suicide for adults who are terminally ill. What, if anything, does the Bible say about this issue?

On this Remembrance Sunday we reflect on the scars of Christ, inspired by Edward Shillito’s poem Jesus of the Scars

If we have never sought, we seek Thee now;
Thine eyes burn through the dark, our only stars;
We must have sight of thorn-pricks on Thy brow,
We must have Thee, O Jesus of the Scars.

The heavens frighten us; they are too calm;
In all the universe we have no place.
Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?
Lord Jesus, by Thy Scars, we claim Thy grace.

If, when the doors are shut, Thou drawest near,
Only reveal those hands, that side of Thine;
We know to-day what wounds are, have no fear,
Show us Thy Scars, we know the countersign.

The other gods were strong; but Thou wast weak;
They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne;
But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak,
And not a god has wounds, but Thou alone.

On our college Sunday we are joined by third year student Andrew Gray

On our college Sunday we have New Testament tutor, Peter Firth

In Romans 2 Paul turns from the condition of all humanity, to the specific dangers that those who have been forgiven are prone to.

In Romans 1:18-32 we find the first elements of Paul’s argument for salvation by faith alone. But he begins in a very shocking and disturbing way, he begins with wrath. Before the gospel can be about demonstrating God’s love it must first be about God’s wrath – what to do with the furious, devastating, and entirely justified wrath of God?
That is the problem to which the gospel is the only possible answer.

Paul has many important, and weighty, things to say to the believers in Rome, but before he says any of them he has something that he needs to say first