Romans 12:13 - Printer Friendly

ESV: Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.

NIV: Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.

NASB: contributing to the needs of the saints, practicing hospitality.

CSB: Share with the saints in their needs; pursue hospitality.

NLT: When God’s people are in need, be ready to help them. Always be eager to practice hospitality.

KJV: Distributing to the necessity of saints; given to hospitality.

NKJV: distributing to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality.

So far, Paul has written generally that Christians must be devoted to each other. They should show brotherly affection and honor to one another. The two commands in this verse describes practical ways we can do that.

First, Paul writes that we must contribute to the needs of other believers. The practice of the church in its earliest days was for wealthier Christians to sell their belongings to meet the physical needs of Christians who were not as well off. Not only did these acts of sacrificial giving demonstrate sincere service to God, they demonstrated to other believers and the watching world that these Christians practiced what they talked about.

In the same way, we are commanded to show hospitality to each other. The world can be a cold, lonely, and dangerous place. One hallmark of the Christian community is that it is meant to offer safe and welcoming spaces to believers through the hospitality of other believers. Traveling from town to town in Paul's day was always a risk. Christians welcomed by other genuine believers as they passed through or arrived in a new town were protected from thieves, weather, and violence. We're called to provide the same service to each other, in the contexts of our own individual cultures.

Romans 12:9–21 is a list of numerous brief, bullet-pointed commands. Taken together, they paint a picture of what the living-sacrifice Christian life should look like. The unifying theme of the list is setting ourselves aside, to effectively love and serve the Lord, each other, and even our enemies. We must serve with enthusiasm and focus, mastering our emotions to rejoice in our future and be patient in our present. We must refuse to sink to evil's level in taking revenge and instead overcome evil by doing good to those who harm us.

In Romans 12, Paul describes the worship of our God as becoming living sacrifices to our God, giving up seeking what we want from life and learning to know and serve what God wants. That begins with using our spiritual gifts to serve each other in the church. Paul's list of commands describes a lifestyle of setting ourselves aside. Our goal as Christians is to love and lift each other up. We must focus our expectation on eternity and wait with patience and prayer for our Father to provide. We must refuse to sink to evil's level, giving good to those who harm us instead of revenge.

Romans 11 ended with a hymn describing God's vast ownership of the universe. Romans 12 begins by asking the question, ''Since He owed us nothing and has given us great mercy, how should we respond?'' The answer is a life of self-sacrificing worship spent in serving the Lord and other believers, refusing revenge and overcoming evil with good. Romans 13 will continue to describe God's intended lifestyle for those in Christ.

The book of Romans is the New Testament's longest, most structured, and most detailed description of Christian theology. Paul lays out the core of the gospel message: salvation by grace alone through faith alone. His intent is to explain the good news of Jesus Christ in accurate and clear terms. As part of this effort, Paul addresses the conflicts between law and grace, between Jews and Gentiles, and between sin and righteousness. As is common in his writing, Paul closes out his letter with a series of practical applications.