theme of creation, corruption and glorification... yar/ for is used providing the reason for each claim - hope is repeated 5 times - the verb apedexomai is repeated three times v 19.,23, 25 and apokaradokia 'eager expectation' in v 19 - hopeful waitig - This clarification of hope is followed by five more extensive lines that explain the role of the Spirit in the context of groaning and suffering creatures. v 26-27 - there is a coming glory to be revealed to us -
18-30 - rationale concerning the hopeful suffering of the children of God.
v18 - present suffering in view of future glory... vv19-27 - the explanation of hopeful suffering in the context of a groaning creation
19-23 the cosmic context of suffering
19-21 the yearning of creation for redemption
19 the creation yearns for human redemption
20 the incompleteness of creation itself - the creation subjected to futility - the rationale of divine subjection in hope
21 the creation itself will be redeemed
21b the creation will ultimately contribute to the glory of human liberation
22-23 Human suffering as part of the creation's yearning for redemption
22 humans are aware of their inclusion in the groaning of creation
23a even spirit filled believers participate in suffering
23b believers groan for the 'redemption of our body.'
For Paul, the sufferings experienced by believers 'are not equivalent in comparison with eth glory' yet to be revealed, for the weight of such glory is incalcuably immense.
The reference to the sufferings 'of the present critical time' employs the expression found in 3:26, to nun kairos, respresenting the eschatological period inaugrated by Christ. Although commentators note that the sufferings to be experienced by the saints in the eschaton was a traditional motif - the context - Roman believers who had already experienced harassment and deportation and whose everyday life as members of the Roman underclass was anything but idyllic - yet the Roman propoganda was that there was to be a golden age of paradise with the reign of Augustus Caesar... 'here is Caesar and all of Iulis' progeny, coming beneath the revolving heaven. This man, this is he, whom you often hear promised to you, Augustus Caesar, son of a god, who will establish once more... the Golden Age in the fields once ruled by Saturn.'
Paul cuts through this propaganistic nonsense to refer directly to the pathemata (passions, sufferings) suffered by the Roman believers, employing the plural form... used also in 2 cor 1:5,6,7; Gal 5:24; Phil 3:10; Col 1:24) referring to the sufferings that believers should expect in following a suffering Christ.
(look nup his ref to 8:17) - While the enture fallen world is subject to 'sinful passions' of 7.5, these particular sufferings are a sign of eschatological solidarity with Christ.
The expression ten mellousan doxan should be translated in the edjectival sense of 'the future glory' rather than linking the participle with the verb to depict the close proximity of 'about to be revealed.... Paul used a similiar expression in Gal 3:25 ('the future faith to be revealed'), indicating that such faith became available only in the future. 'To be revealed' is a paralell to the Romans, conveying an apocalyptic disclosure of the triumph of God over adversity and the corruption of the cosmic order... the originally intended glory of the creation shall yet be restored, including specifically the glory humans were intended to bear.
Yje [hrase eis emas, which ends the verse could be translated 'for us,' implying that the glory is 'to be bestowed upon us, so that we become actual partakers; it is not a glory of which we are to be mere spectators; and in contrast to imperial claims, ot is ota glory that shines from the head of Caesar alone. The concept of glory implied in this passahe is quite distant from the classical Greek sense of opinion, reputation, or renown ascribed by public opinion; it is closely related to the Hebrew sense of doxa as innnate weightiness,
beauty honour, fiery presence, spledor or power... to shine beyond others... used 200 times to portray such themes as royal or divine power (Isa ps, hos etc) the fiery radiance floweunbg from the tent of meeting exod lev, from mount sinai exod pr from the temple... The 'glory og God' therefore has the concrete meaning of a fiery phenomenon issuing from radiance and brilliance, and an abstract meanning of honour, worthiness and majesty - Human beings were created to reflect such glory - (ps. 8:1, 5-6) sich is particularly visable in the wise, and is symbolised through the ane crown or diadem... when persons or nations become corrupt and dall - they lose their glory (Hos 4:7; 9:11; Jer 2:11; Ezek 24:25) But when Yahweh redeems them, their glory is restored Isa 35:1-2_
Romans 8:18 - connects with Revelation and the resoration of glory
Isahaih 40:5 'then the glory of Yahweh shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together. the revelation of divine radiance and glory, to be seen by all the nations, is also expressed in isa 60:1-3 - a vision that will one day fill the world...
Glory then - as described by Paul is NOT restricted to a future state of immortality - 'Paul intends the beleaguered believers in Rome to discern in the growing triumph of the gospel the initual evidence pf this lory, which will one day fill the creation [corrie ten boom] evidence of gods glory in the midst of suffering - In the glowing faces aroundthe circle of early Christian love feasts, the proleptic evidence of this restoration could be seen
v19
Eager expectation - also includes humans in Phil 1:20
Paul implies that the entire creation waits with baited breath from the emergence and empowerment of those who will take responsibility for its restoration.
As the children of God are redeemed by the gospel they begin to regain a rightful dominion over the created world - in more modern terms - their altered lifestyles and rivised ethic befin to restor the ecological system that had been thrown out of balance by wrongdoing (1:18) and Sin Romans 5-7
relatedness is at the heart of creation - ecosystems -
transformed children of God... Romans 12:1-2 -
v20
the yearning of creation for redemption - allusion is made to the genesis story - the perversion of the good and glorious creayion -
'In the Genesis account, the divine curse upon the ground resulted in its producing thorns and thistles cauding chronic frustration symbolized by the sweat on the face of adams descendants Gen 3:17-19 - in the powergul symbolization humans trying to play God eneded up ruininh not only their relations with each other but also their relaytion to the natural world.
emptiness, vanity, fruitfulness/// would have ;ed heareres to think of ecclesiasted - eccl 1:2
roman 1:21 describes the frustration and destructiveness of persons or geoups who suppeess the truth and refuse to recognise God... the basic idea is that the human refusal to accept limitations ruins the wordl if green - by acting out of idolatrous desires to have unlimited dominion over the garden, the original purpose of the creation - to express divine goodness Gen 1:31 and reflect divine glory Ps 19:1-4 was emptied... as in eccl 2:1-7 - the drive fro fame prestige and immortal achievement that evacuates the goodness and glory of the creayion and pules up endless frustrations in the human interacyion with the natural environment symbolized in Gen by thorns and thistles
Paul does not subscribe to a gnostic view of the world as unnately frustrating and evil -
'on account of the one who subjected it - referring to God's curse against the land in response to human sin - Ezra 7:1 - and when adam transgressed my statutes, what had been made was judge
Hope in romans 5:2 was used by Paul with ref to overcoming suffering - inthis passage - hope is that the human race which had defaced the world would be redeemed and would gebin to particupate in removing the curse from the land... a future hope...
v21
v21
because - the whole of creation was marked by hope - that creation itself will also be set free from distortion.... righteousness restored by the true king is one of the prophetic themes we looked at during the winter sermon series running up to Christmas...
and also - Isa 11,65,66 - the restoration of relationships - between animals and humans - etc.jubilees envisions the time when 'the heacens and the earth shall be renewed 1:29
Overcoming ecological disorder is depicted here as a divine gift enacted as a result of God's restoration of humanity to its position of rightful dominion, reflecting God's intended glory
The glory proclaimed by Paul will be shared by every concerted person, whether slave or free, male or female, Roman or barbarian. 'bondage stands in opposition to freedom, corrumption to glory' in this passage. The term psora - corruption, decay, destruction, refers to the consequence of the perverse 'vanity' of the human race, namely, the disruption and death of natural ecologial systems...This occurs in a process that takes a course of its own, thwarting human efforts at dominion and producing a veritable 'bondage to corruption.'
I take the second genitive in the phrase apo tes douleias tes psoras'" as an objective genitive, “from the bondage to corruption,” following Lipsius, 139, who refers to corruption as “a ruling power.” For arguments in favor of a genitive of quality,
Liberation consisting of glory - i=understood as humans regaininga proper dominion over the creation - freedom must be responsibly embodies in the real world as the new creation manifests itself in the lives and actions of believers... humans and the creation are interdepende t and that human fulfillment is contextual and cosmic//// the glory of the people of God will be in the context of the restitution of all things... this stands against the individualizing of salvation
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