Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Romans. Tonight is study 23 of Romans, chapter 1, and we are going to read Romans 1:9-12:

For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers; Making request, if by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come unto you. For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift, to the end ye may be established; That is, that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me.

I will stop reading there. We read in Romans 1:9:

For God is my witness…

The Apostle Paul was moved to write this statement as he was addressing the Romans, and we saw that in the previous verse, he had said, “I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, that your faith (the faith of the Lord Jesus) is spoken of (preached) throughout the whole world.” That is, the Gospel of Christ was going out far and wide. And then he added, in Romans 1:9:

For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son…

We find when we look up the word “witness,” it is a Greek word that is pronounced similarly to “martyr.” We will look at a few places we find this same word, starting in 2Corinthians 1:21-23:

Now he which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God; Who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts. Moreover I call God for a record upon my soul, that to spare you I came not as yet unto Corinth.

The word “record” is our word that was translated as “witness.” Here, the Apostle Paul is writing about the anointing and the sealing; that is, God giving the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts, the hearts of those He has saved. We have that “down payment,” as it were, just as God promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, of eternal life and the eternal inheritance that will accompany it. And that is “the earnest of the Spirit,” and because we have the Spirit of God within us in our new resurrected, born-again souls, Paul is able to write, “Moreover I call God for a witness upon my soul.” God is a witness upon the soul because that is where He dwells – He dwells within. It is a similar idea to our verse in Romans 1:9: “For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit,” or in the soul; God is able to witness because He can see the soul. Only God can see the soul, and we know the Bible says: “…all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.” God is able to look on the inward man. That is how God looks, but we can only look on the outward individual.

We cannot take a peek into or get a glimpse into what is happening in the soul of another person. We can only get indicators as they speak and do. The things they say and the things they do reveal the condition of the heart, and that is the only way to try to get a “reading” on whether a person is saved, or not, and we could be wrong. We are infallible. We do not know the spiritual condition of another person within his soul, so that is why God tells us not to bother making that judgment: “You are not the judge. I am the Judge. Leave that to me.” And that is fine with the people of God because we do not want to know – it is not for us to know. But God does know, and He is the witness upon our soul and its condition.

We read in Philippians 1:8-10:

For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ. And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ;

The word “record” is the word for “witness.” It says, “For God is my record, how greatly I long after you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ.” This word “bowels” is often associated with mercy and compassion. It is translated one time as “inward affection,” in 2Corinthians 7:15. That gives us some idea of its use: “For God is my witness, how greatly I long after you all in the inward affection (or mercy) of the Lord Jesus Christ.” That is, he is beseeching God and praying. In this Epistle to the Philippians, he is praying for the Philippians, and in the book of Romans, it was the Romans.

Or, we can to 1Thessalonians 2:2-6:

But even after that we had suffered before, and were shamefully entreated, as ye know, at Philippi, we were bold in our God to speak unto you the gospel of God with much contention. For our exhortation was not of deceit, nor of uncleanness, nor in guile: But as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the gospel, even so we speak; not as pleasing men, but God, which trieth our hearts. For neither at any time used we flattering words, as ye know, nor a cloke of covetousness; God is witness: Nor of men sought we glory, neither of you, nor yet of others, when we might have been burdensome, as the apostles of Christ.

Here, God is witness to their conduct and the way they handled the Gospel and shared the Gospel, as well as their inward motivation that was “not as pleasing men, but God.” And God was witness to that. God knows, does He not? He knows when someone is being phony, or when someone is man-focused rather than God-focused, and when they are trying to flatter men rather than being faithful to God. God knows these things and He is witness.

Actually, that is a name of God, if we turn to Revelation 1:5:

And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood,

Jesus Christ is the faithful witness. And, again, it is the Spirit of Christ that indwells His people and is able to witness within. We can be very thankful for that because this also works in us when we hear the (true) Gospel. Christ said, “My sheep hear my voice.” So we have the Spirit of Christ, the faithful witness, inwardly, and this helps our spiritual hearing. Our ears perk up. And if we go the wrong way, we get uncomfortable. I do not want to say “feeling,” but things do not sound correct and we are troubled. God can “disturb” us inwardly, as He dwells within us. And if we go the right way, there can be a sense of finding it faithful and our ears are satisfied. Of course, it is not a “feeling,” but it is a result of checking things out in the Bible, comparing Scripture with Scripture regarding the teaching we are hearing, and the Spirit of Christ is the faithful witness. What does it say in Romans? It says in Romans 8:14:

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.

You see, God is not waiting for us to do the leading. No – we are led by the Spirit and the Spirit guides into all truth. He is leading us. We are not leading Him. We are not forging the way out in the front. No way. It is the Holy Spirit that guides the individual elect child of God, not the other way around. Again, it says in Romans 8:14-16:

For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

The Spirit of Christ indwells us, and He bears witness with our spirits. How does that work? When He teaches us the truth and moves within us to will and to do of His good pleasure and to fulfill the will of God, then there is this witness or testimony in our souls: “Yes, we are going the right way.” The Holy Spirit is guiding in this direction according to the understanding of the Word of God, and we are properly following the Biblical methodology as the Holy Ghost teaches and guides into truth. We are students of the Bible under instruction of the Holy Spirit as He teaches us. Yes – it is our fingers that are moving (through the Bible), but remember God teaches our fingers to “war.” We are turning pages. We are taking time to look in the concordance and check out the words, but God is working things out within us to make sure we do these things, and then He is giving us ears to hear as we compare Scriptures. This Scripture gives this bit of information, and that Scripture gives that bit of information. And maybe we could go a wrong way, but there is that internal sense. We can grieve the Spirit if we error and go down a wrong path, so there are many safeguards that God has built within the elect, and this is why we do come to truth. And it is why He was able to seal up the information until the time of the end, knowing that His people would understand and come to realize the Biblical calendar of history and all these other end-time doctrines.

Sometimes we might be a little in awe of these things because of such glorious and weighty doctrines, like the end of the church age, and Christ having died and having made atonement for sins at the foundation of the world, and the elect appearing before the judgment seat of Christ. These things are incredible truths, and we know our limitations and finite weaknesses and, yet, we should not look at that, but look to infinite, eternal and all-wise God who indwells us and leads and guides and keeps us on the right path. That is why we are going the right way today. That is why we are understanding things in a correct manner. It is because of God, not because of us. We would be in big trouble if we were leading the way, but thanks be to God (as the Bible says) that He is the teacher. He is the one who directs our course.

Let us go back to Romans 1:9:

For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son…

The word “with” would probably be better translated as “in.” “whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel of his Son…” The word “in” that appears after “spirit” is the same word translated as “with.” It is a little Greek preposition, and it is better understood that way because it is “in” our spirit that we serve God or that we serve the Lord Jesus Christ.

Let us look at a few verses where this word “serve” is found. It says in Acts 27:21-24:

But after long abstinence Paul stood forth in the midst of them, and said, Sirs, ye should have hearkened unto me, and not have loosed from Crete, and to have gained this harm and loss. And now I exhort you to be of good cheer: for there shall be no loss of any man's life among you, but of the ship. For there stood by me this night the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve, Saying, Fear not, Paul; thou must be brought before Caesar…

Here, it is the same language: “…the angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve,” as the Apostle Paul was moved to say, because he belongs to God. He belongs to Christ. Here, of course, the “angel of God” is another name of God. We read of the “angel of JEHOVAH,” in the Old Testament. It is one of Christ’s names. And Paul, who is a pattern of believers, belongs to Him, so he says, “…whose I am,” just as we belong to Him. We are “bought with a price,” we read in a couple of places in 1Corinthians. We are bought. We have been purchased by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ when He shed His blood, paid for our sins, thereby buying or redeeming us. So we are His, and that is why we serve God: “…whom I serve.” We serve God because we are servants. Yes – there is other Biblical language that says we are adopted into the family of God, but we are still servants. We are still obligated to serve God, to obey God and to keep His commandments. These are the things that the Bible would have the people of God to do. We do not need to know anything tremendous, but we learn the truth of the Word of God, by God’s grace, and we keep the truth of the Word of God, by God’s grace, through His Spirit. We just put one foot in front of the other, following the Holy Spirit as He teaches through comparison of Scriptures, and once we understand what the truth is in a matter, we do it. We perform the doing of it, but not out of our own ability, because we have no ability in ourselves, but through the ability that God gives in our spirits. He has given us a new resurrected soul that is without sin, so that spirit is keeping the Law of God perfectly from within. And we have the indwelling Spirit of God Himself. There is still the flesh to contend with, so there is certainly an ongoing struggle, but by God’s grace we follow the truth. For example, when we see that Sunday is the Sabbath, we follow it – not to get right with God because no man is justified by works. But because God has loved us, we love Him, and the Bible defines love as keeping His commandments. Therefore, when we see a commandment for a husband toward his wife or a wife toward a husband, or children toward parents, we do all these things just to show forth love to God, just as He has shown great love to us.

The same word translated as “serve” is also translated as “worship” in Acts 24:14:

But this I confess unto thee, that after the way which they call heresy, so worship I the God of my fathers, believing all things which are written in the law and in the prophets:

What was true then is true today. The Apostle Paul followed the Spirit, the truth and the Lord Jesus Christ, and served Him by following these things. And, of course, the church of his day (the synagogue system) called him a heretic. They wanted to stay in the Law of Moses and keep their religious system as it had been for many centuries – no changes. Unfortunately, they were living in a time when God made change, and when God makes change, we are to follow wherever the Holy Spirit leads. Again, the leaders and rulers of Israel were trying to take the lead. They were the ones who were going to determine what the truth was, and they thought the truth was what they had believed for centuries, and they wanted to keep it going. But it was all wrong.

It was just like the end of the church era, which we have lived through during the Great Tribulation. God made a change, and they refused: “No – we are not going that way. We are going to stay in the churches. It has worked for almost two thousand years, so where do you get off as you come along and try to change things?” But we are not trying to change anything. God made the change. God made a change in His program. God is God, and when God changes things, you have to follow. If you do not follow, you are in rebellion against God. It is very simple. And they (the Jews in the synagogues) were in rebellion.

In Philippians 3, there is also the same word and it is translated as “worship” here, too. It says in Philippians 3:2-3:

Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the concision. For we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh.

And, again, there is language connected this “service” or “worship” of God in the spirit, as it said in Romans 1:9: “For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel of his Son.”

We spent a long time talking about the “Son,” so we will not get into that. We understand that this was the name given to Christ when He rose from the dead at the foundation of the world, declared to be the Son of God. So the Apostle Paul was saying that he serves in his spirit in the gospel of His Son. The Gospel is a synonym for the Word of God, the Bible. He served God in the Word of His Son, and it was in the spirit, the indwelling Spirit of Christ in his new, born-again spirit, and that is where this “service” or “worship” is done.

Then it goes on to say in the last part of the verse in Romans 1:9:

… that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers;

There are a number of verses I wanted to look at regarding the phrase “without ceasing” in its relationship to prayer. We do not have time right now, so we will look at the second part of verse 9 in our next Bible study.