Romans 1:1 : Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God. On the phrase, "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ," James Macknight remarks: "The original word 'doulos' properly signifies a slave. Here it is a name of honor for in the East the chief ministers of kings were called 'douloi,' slaves . . . . This honorable name, therefore, denotes the high authority which Paul possessed in the kingdom of Christ, as one of his chief ministers." In the phrase, "called to be an apostle," the words "to be" were supplied by the translators. They frequently supplied words with the intention of making the meaning clearer to the English reader. These supplied words are printed in italics. But in this place the supplied words hinder rather than help. The word translated "called" is not a verb nor a participle, but a verbal adjective. It partakes of the nature of a verb and an adjective. The sense is complete and clear, if you read it, "a called apostle." Paul was not telling what he was called to be, but what he was. Some Judaizing teachers charged that he was not a regularly constituted apostle, but that he had merely assumed that office, or had been appointed to that office by the church at Antioch. To meet that charge, Paul asserts that he was "a called apostle"--an apostle that had been called into that office by Jesus Christ. He was separated from Judaism and from all other lines of activity, and dedicated to the one business of preaching the gospel. His own motto was in harmony with his calling "This one thing I do." It was God's gospel, because it originated with him and came from him. It was in no sense a product of man's theorizing or philosophizing. It was not a mere addition to the law of Moses, as some Judaizers sought to make it. Paul did not preach his conception of Christianity, but he preached the gospel as the Holy Spirit moved him. He preached "a new and living way."