The Mirror Translation: Romans Revealed

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Romans Revealed

THE MIRROR TRANSLATION

The Mirror Translation is a paraphrased translation from the original text.
While strictly following the literal meaning of the original text, sentences have been constructed so that the larger meaning is continually emphasized by means of an expanded text. Some clarifying notes are included in italics.
This is a paraphrased study rather than a literal translation. While the detailed shades of meaning of every Greek word have been closely studied, this is done taking into account the consistent context of the entire chapter within the wider epistle, and bearing in mind the full context of Jesus and his finished work, which is what the message of the Bible is all about.

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Translated books: (June 2011) Romans, Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians, Hebrews, James, Efesiers (Afrikaans).
2 Peter 1, 1 Cor.1-9, John 1,

ROMANS REVEALED

Introduction

The free eagle
During our honeymoon in January 1979 in the Blyderiver Canyons in Mpumalanga South Africa, Lydia and I met a nature conservation officer who told us of a fascinating incident when they released a Black Eagle that was in the Pretoria zoo for ten years. This happened about a week prior to our visit. She told us how excited they were when the bird finally arrived in its wooden crate. They knew that this was the day for this eagle to be freed and to return to the life of its design. But their excitement soon turned to frustration when, after opening the cage, the bird refused to fly! The ten years of caged life seemed to have trapped its mind in an invisible enclosure! How could they get the eagle to realise that it was indeed free? No amount of prompting and prodding seemed to help. Then, after some hours the bird suddenly looked up, and in the distance they heard the call of another eagle; this was the moment of true freedom! Immediately the zoo-eagle took off in flight! No flying lessons are required when truth is realised!
This dramatic story left a deep impression on my mind. I knew that in the light of Paul’s revelation of the good news, we are left with one urgent priority, which is to announce to the nations with bold confidence the truth about their original identity and mirror reflect the integrity of their redeemed innocence.
This gives such clarity and content to the fact that Jesus came to the planet not to upgrade the cage of Jewish or any other religion by starting a new brand called, Christianity; but to be the incarnate voice of the likeness and image of God in human form! He came to reveal and redeem the image of God in us! His mission was to mirror the blueprint of our design, not as an example for us but of us! Col.1:15, 2:9,10.
In God’s faith mankind is associated in Christ even before the foundation of the world. Jesus died humanity’s death and when the stone was rolled away, we were raised together with him! Every human life is fully represented in him! Hosea 6:2.
If the gospel is not the voice of the free eagle it is not the gospel.

Paul’s Gospel
In this pivotal book Paul immediately introduces himself and his intention:
“My mandate and message is to announce the goodness of God to mankind. This message is what the Scriptures are all about. It remains the central prophetic theme and content of inspired writing.” Rom 1:1,2
Scripture could never again be interpreted in any other way! The gospel of the success of the cross alone gives content and context to the Bible.
There is nothing to be ashamed about; this message unveils how God got it right to rescue man from the effect of what Adam did wrong! Rom 1:16,17.
The dynamic of the gospel is the revelation of God’s faith as the only valid basis of our belief. (From faith to faith) Paul quotes Habakkuk who prophetically introduced a new era when he realized that righteousness will be founded in what God believes and not in man’s clumsy ability to obey the law. From now on righteousness by faith defines life! Hab 2:4, Rom 1:17, Rom 3:27.
Instead of reading the curse when disaster strikes, Habakkuk realizes that the Promise outdates performance as the basis to man’s acquittal! Deut 28 would no longer be the motivation or the measure of right or wrong behavior! “Though the fig tree do not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation. GOD, the Lord, is my strength; he makes my feet like hinds' feet, he makes me tread upon my high places. Hab 3:17 - 19
From Romans chapters 1:18 to 3:20 Paul proceeds to give a graphic display of distorted human behavior. Being a Jew, and therefore to know the law, offers no real advantage since it offers no disguise or defense from sin. It is the same ugliness and deserves the same judgment.
His triumphant statement in v 16,17 of chapter 1 and again reinforced in chapter 3:21-24, is set against this backdrop. The good news declares how the same condemned mankind in Adam is now freely acquitted by God’s grace through the redemption that is unveiled in Christ Jesus.
He brings the argument of the ineffectiveness of the law to get man to change his behavior, to a final crescendo in Chapter 7. He states in 7 verse 1 that he is writing to those who know the law. They have firsthand experience therefore of the weakness of the rule to consistently govern the conduct of man.
The best that the law could offer was to educate and confirm good intention; but the more powerful law, the law of sin introduced to mankind through one man’s transgression, has to be challenged by a greater force than human willpower.
Because sin robbed man of his true identity and awakened in him all kinds of worse-than-animal-like conduct, a set of rules couldn’t do it. The revelation of God’s righteousness has to be far more effective and powerful than man’s slavery to sin.
It is evident that because of man’s corrupt behavior, mankind deserves nothing less than condemnation. Yet within this context the grace and mercy of God is revealed; not as mere tolerance from God’s side to turn a blind eye and to put up with sin, but as God’s triumphant act in Christ to cancel man’s guilt and to break sin’s spell and dominion over man.
For salvation to be relevant it has to offer mankind a basis and reference for his faith to be launched from. It has to offer a conclusion of greater implication than the stalemate condition he finds himself in under the dispensation of the law.
“Even though my inner man agrees that the law is good and desires to obey its requirements, my best intentions leave me powerless against the demands of sin in my body! Oh, wretched man that I am!”
Woe be unto us, but for the revelation of God’s righteous intervention! The man Christ Jesus is the mediator of humanity. The judgment man rightfully deserved fell on him; he was made to be sin who knew no sin. “He was handed over because of our transgressions, and triumphantly raised because of our acquittal.” Rom 4:25
Paul is convinced that whatever happened to the human race because of Adam’s fall is far superseded in every possible proportion by the revelation of mankind’s inclusion in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. He places the fall of Adam and every act of unrighteousness that followed against the one act of righteousness that God performed in Christ as proof of man’s acquittal.
The revelation of righteousness by faith unveils how God in Christ represented and redeemed mankind. The etymological essence of the word, ‘righteousness’ in its root form, diké, implies the idea of two parties finding likeness in each other; with no interference of any sense of blame, guilt or inferiority. The Hebrew word for righteousness is the word tzadok which refers to the wooden beam in a scale of balances. When Adam lost the glory of God (Hebrew, kabod, weight; the consciousness of God’s likeness and image) the law proved that no amount of good works could balance the scale again. Grace reveals how God redeemed his image and likeness again in human form; now the scale is perfectly balanced! No wonder Jesus cried out on the cross, “It is finished!”

This is the message that Paul says he owes to the whole world!
“I proclaim Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery which was concealed in silence in the sequence of timeless ages, but now is made publicly known, mirrored in prophetic scripture.” (“Surely he was wounded for our transgressions; He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement that brought us peace was upon him and by his stripes we were healed” Isaiah 53:4,5). And now the God of the ages has issued his mandate to make the mystery known in such a way that all the nations of the earth will discover the lifestyle that the hearing of faith ignites” Romans 16:25,26 Paul gives new definition to obedience when he calls it ‘the obedience of faith” Rom 1:5.

“The conclusion is clear: it took just one offence to condemn mankind; one act of righteousness declares the same mankind innocent. The disobedience of the one man exhibits humanity as sinners, the obedience of another man exhibits humanity as righteous. Romans 5:18,19

Just as all men became exceedingly sinful through one man’s disobedience but did not know it until the law revealed it, so all men became exceedingly righteous through one act of righteousness but they do not know it until the gospel reveals it.

The principle of faith is to see what God sees. God calls things which seem not to be as though they were. Romans 4:17 “While we look not at the things that the senses observe, but we look at the revelation of the unseen as it is unveiled in our understanding through the mirror revelation of the Gospel of Christ. 2 Cor. 3:18; 2 Cor.4:18

Romans 4:17 finds its context in Rom 1:17 and 10:17, “It is clear then that faith’s source is found in the content of the message heard; the message is Christ. (We are God’s audience; Jesus is God’s language!)”

He is the voice of the free eagle!

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