Ordinary People - Part 1

I'm looking at Romans, chapter 16. Apparently Paul didn't have much trouble remembering names. What a great list of people we might never have known of
--people who assisted Paul and enabled him to become the spiritual father of so many of us.

He starts with Phoebe: I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a servant in the church in Cenchrea. I ask you to receive her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints and to give her any help she may need from you, for she has been a great help to many people, including me.

Then Paul lists 32 other names. Twenty four of these folks were in Rome and would be reading, or listening to, this letter to the church at Rome (vv. 3-16). Nine, including Phoebe, were with Paul in Corinth (Cenchrea was a port at Corinth)and were joining Paul in sending greetings to their fellow Christians in Rome (vv.21-24). Then there were 2 unnamed women and a number of unnamed men.

You might think a list of names like this would be boring, or uninteresting, at best.

I thought so. But I was wrong. And it is hard not to notice how many of them are women!

Paul was the great theologian and scholar. But he was also deeply interested in people. A rare combination. And we can see it so clearly here in Romans 16. It is a rare look into his personality and probably is one of the secrets of his great appeal to people of all levels of society.

Who was Phoebe? All we know about her is right here in Romans 16. Apparently she was the one who would hand deliver Paul's letter to the Christians in Rome.

So she must have been trustworthy, and probably wealthy, because only wealthy people could travel in those days. And so she would be a prominent, well-respected and well-known woman.

In the Roman empire days most letters were hand delivered. The only "postal" system was used for the military.

Paul tells the Roman Christians to treat Phoebe like they would treat other saints, like himself -- quite an endorsement of her character!

Phoebe is a pagan name, a form of the name given to the god Apollo. But she had become a Christian and served the church there at Corinth.

She was probably single, because Paul did not make any reference to a husband, but likely she had some traveling companions, because a woman probably would not travel alone in those days.

Maybe she was like Lydia of Philippi, whose business involved the buying and selling of purple cloth and who was converted when Paul preached in Philippi. A businesswoman.

Maybe she was a deaconess, because the word for deaconess, an appointed or elected officer of the church, is the same as the word for servant.

But no matter what her exact position (and we know being a servant is the highest position in God's eyes) she carried with her a truly great document. If Paul's letter to the Romans had not arrived, would there ever have been a Reformation? International revivals like the Great Awakening? An American Revolution? Probably not.

But this is all hypothetical, since it was in the eternal plan of God that the letter to the Romans reached Rome, found its way into the canon, and has been read for 20 centuries.

How many people have received Jesus Christ's message of salvation by reading the verses we call The Roman Road?

Phoebe never saw any of this. She was just delivering a letter from her friend to his friends in Rome. But what she carried changed the course of history.

In the next verses (vv.3-16) Paul lists some of those who will be reading his letter in Rome.

1. Priscilla and Aquila They are mentioned six times in scripture so we know a little about them.

Aquila was a Jew from Pontus (an area today in northeastern Turkey), who settled in Rome. He and his wife, Priscilla, had to leave Rome when the Emperor Claudius expelled the Jews. In one reference Aquila is listed first, but in the other five instances Priscilla's name is given first.

Aquila was a tentmaker, as was Paul. In Corinth Paul teamed up with the couple during his ministry there. When he left for Ephesus, they went with him, and then remained in Ephesus to continue teaching the Gospel while Paul continued his missionary journey. One of their outstanding students was Apollos, a famous orator who later became an important Christian worker.

Later the couple returned to Rome, and so Paul sends his special greetings to them.

They were faithful to the Gospel message and courageous, since Paul tells us they risked their lives for him. We don't know when that was -- maybe that time in Ephesus when the mob led by the makers of idols of the goddess Diana were rioting.

Now that they were back in Rome they had a group of Christians meeting in their home.

2. Epenetus. Paul calls him his dear friend. Paul also says that Epenetus was the first convert to Christ in the province of Asia. Since Paul was the first to evangelize Asia, he himself must have led Epenetus to Christ, and was particularly interested in his growth and maturity as a Christian.

3. Mary. There are many women named Mary in the New Testament, but this woman was not one of the ones mentioned in the Gospels. When Paul says, she worked very hard for you, it likely means she lived in Rome and helped the Christians there in ways that only a native Roman could.

The others listed will be included in Part 2.

What all this says to me is that the church, in every century, has been led, sustained, blessed and enriched largely by unsung heroes -- people like Paul lists here in Romans 16. People like you and me.

No one is insignificant in the purposes of God.


Continued in Part 2.