Romans 1:8
8 First [proton] [men], I thank [eucharisteo] my [mou] God [theos] through [dia] Jesus [Iesous] Christ [Christos] for [huper] you [humon] all [pas], that [hoti] your [humon] faith [pistis] is spoken [kataggello] of
throughout [en] the whole [holos] world [kosmos]. KJV-Interlinear
8 First, I thank my God through
Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the
whole world. NASB
Getting the gospel and doctrine to the entire world
in our present day, is a phenomenal opportunity, and is accomplishable when a
few make the leap and invest in that effort. And because of that commitment,
huge numbers of people have the opportunity to come to Christ and to their own
personal spiritual life.
In our current day, communication to nearly
everyone in the entire world can be virtually instant. Geographical boundaries and barriers, even
language, are almost non-existent obstacles, due to smart phones, the internet,
the abundance of translator devices, and the worldwide usage of English in one
form or another.
Back in Pauls day, the method of communication was
by means of verbal or travel, or letter.
Written communication was extremely limited. But the Greek language was known and used by virtually
everyone.
And so, even in that ancient time, and even without
our technical resources, the gospel of Christ was spread throughout the known
world. The spread of the gospel and
doctrine was not instant, and often times took weeks to get from one place to
another, but spread it did.
The faith that Paul refers to, is of the
fundamental concept and principles of Christianity.
The city of Rome was the center of evil and
opposition toward Christinaity, and yet it was also a growing center of Christianity.
Today, our entire world is a vast center of evil
and growing opposition toward Christianity.
Back then, the gospel was spread by word of mouth
from port to port, from village to village, from city to city.
Today, the gospel is spread by word of mouth by means
of the internet and other various instant technologies.
But by either high tech or low, we all have God the
Father, through Christ, to thank, for any and all methods of communication. With God, there is no such thing as an
impossible barrier, no such thing as, ‘can’t be done.’ All things are possible because God does not
depend on human resources, but by means of the very sovereign power that He
alone possesses.
God does give us all the opportunity to
participate, but that is a courtesy that inevitably demonstrates the genuineness,
or lack of it, of ones commitment to the truth.
And even though not mentioned in this particular
passage, there will be one more remarkable time of gospel spread, and that will
be in the future during the Tribulation, when the entire world will be an
unbelieving world, and yet the gospel will spread like wildfire, and even then
in the face of far worse horrendous times than ever before.
So, if those people can spread the word, within the
scope of their very limited environment, how much more so can we, in our high
tech world?
Who will participate, and who will just have lip
service?
