pat loughery

The small group I’m in is doing a study of Romans, using the LifeChange study guide series from NavPress. The study guide is highly recommended – it’s a good guide to inductive Bible study and looks not just at the parts, but the whole – and context, and transitions, and…

The part of Romans 2 that caught my attention today was verse 10:

[There will be] glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
– Romans 2:10 (NIV)

(One of my many) theological bents is to see Christianity as relationship. I use that word so often that I am afraid my folks are going to put together a Buzzword Bingo sheet with that in the center square.

But Paul, in this passage, reminds me that relationship by itself is incomplete. Relationship with God produces fruit in my work.

Relationship with God without fruit puts me in danger of legalism, abstract thought, and detachment.