This morning I will have the final sessions of my first time teaching Romans. I’ve had such a great time; LST students are such good people to journey with on an adventure like this. I decided to keep back the “formal epistle bits” of 1:1-17 and chapter 16 until the last session. My thought was that just as the formal Thanksgiving section of 1 Corinthians is amazing once you know the rest of the letter well enough to recognise the important themes, perhaps we’d see more of the formal bits once we were familiar with the rest of the letter.
I’ve indeed found some interesting things in the opening verses. Commentators have recognised the towering importance of the phrase “obedience of faith” in verse 5, and there is much discussion about what it means.
There are actually quite a few more interesting points, but what’s less often discussed is the way the relation between Paul calling himself a slave in verse one, and the two main features of slavery: verse 5 obedience and verse 6, ownership — you belong to Jesus Christ.
Imagine how the actual slaves (and slave owners) among the recipients would have received this as the opening to a letter!