7: The Result Of Justification: Peace With God (5:1-11)
7: THE RESULT OF JUSTIFICATION: PEACE WITH GOD (5:1-11)
H aving discussed justification (1:18—4:25), Paul now turns his attention to sanctification (5:1—8:17). In 5:1-11, he will talk about the peace we have with God as a result of justification. In 5:12-21, in a sort of parenthetical section, he will explain the origin of sin. Then, for the remainder of this section (6:1—8:17), he will deal with the sad reality that, even after being eternally justified and forgiven by God, we continue to see all too much sin in our lives.
As we begin this new section, we must remember again that Paul is not writing some sort of theological textbook, but is writing to ordinary men and women. Romans probably represents the customary content of the messages Paul gave whenever he arrived in a new city on his missionary journeys. Since he had never been to Rome, he was probably presenting to them, by way of this letter, the same material with which he began his ministry in each new location. We can just imagine Paul preaching in some new location. As he goes through the things we have read in Romans 1—4, by the end of chapter 4 he has seen several people respond and therefore pass from death to life. So, while in the first four chapters Paul has written as though his readers were still lost, beginning with chapter 5 he is writing as though they are already Christians.
If we had only the first four chapters of Romans, we would have enough information to be saved. All the big intellectual questions of life are answered in these four chapters; whether you’re a simple person or a complex person, a person of the first-century Greek world or a citizen of the twentieth century, there’s more than enough in these first four chapters to bring you from death to life. So, from now on, Paul will talk to us as though we have now accepted Christ as our Savior.
As we have noted, of course, that doesn’t mean there is any discontinuity between chapters 1—4 and chapters 5—8. We were dead (1—4) and now we’re alive (5—8). Having been dead and now being alive, just as Sarah was able to bring forth a child, we can begin to bring forth that which is life and not death. So, Paul begins this next section:
Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. (5:1)
Verb tenses will be very important in our study of this section. Let’s start right off by noting the verb tenses in this opening statement: “Therefore being justified by faith [in the past], we have [in the present] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The Greek makes this past tense very plain. Based upon Christ’s finished work on the cross about 2,000 years ago, and based upon the past specific moment in space and time when we individually accepted Christ as our Savior—whether five minutes of five years ago—based upon what transpired in these two moments in the past, we find ourselves in a certain situation in the present.
This question of historical sequence is a very important distinction and must be kept in mind. There is a constant danger in our culture of thinking of Christianity as merely a sort of a progression, without understanding that there must be a moment of justification, a moment of birth. Just as in a marriage there must have been a moment somewhere in the past at which we came into a contractual marriage relationship with the other person, so also there must have been a moment in the past when by grace we accepted Christ as our Savior and were therefore declared justified by God.
Having accepted Christ as our Savior, “we have peace with God.” The first and most important aspect of this peace with God is not the peace in our own hearts but the fact that God is at peace with us. Though we were separated from God by the guilt of our sin, on the basis of Christ’s finished work God has declared us justified. On the basis of Christ’s finished work, He is at peace with us.
Because God is at peace with us, because He has declared us justified, because we have returned to the purpose of our creation, we can in the present have a relationship with God and can have true peace in our own hearts. People struggle like mad to have peace in their hearts. They try all kinds of psychological methods to find some point of integration. But all such efforts lead only to disappointment unless it involves the relationship and the purpose for which we were created. The only way we can return to that purpose and to that relationship is by having our guilt before God removed on the basis of Christ’s finished work. Once we have thus had our guilt removed, there can be a peace in our hearts that is not false, a peace that, as we shall see in verse 5, will never disappoint us.
Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. (5:1-2)
Our peace with God gives us “access” to certain things in this present life. It is not just a future hope. There is a future aspect of our salvation, and Paul will talk about this more in 8:18-39. But right now he is talking about a peace with God that, for the Christian, is a present reality. This is not just to be an ideal, it is to be something that we experience right now.We are to “rejoice in hope of the glory of God.” This is to be a present experience, because it is a reality. We have returned to the purpose of our creation. This peace can be a present experience because it is true in the framework of the universe as it is. We stand justified in the very presence of the infinite God Himself. God is at peace with us, therefore we should have peace in all aspects of our lives.
Our English translation says we can “rejoice” in hope of the “glory” of God. A more literal translation would be that we can “glory in hope of the glory of God.” We will see the same thought repeated in verses 3 and 11. We “rejoice [glory] in hope of the glory . . .” (verse 2). We “glory in tribulations” (verse 3, where the KJV actually uses the word glory). And we “joy [glory] in God” (verse 11). This glory, this joy, this rejoicing, is what we who have found salvation should have in the present moment, on the basis of the past work of the Lord Jesus and the past moment when individually we passed from death to life by accepting Him as Savior.
Do those of us who have made a profession of faith in Christ experience the reality of this peace with God? God promises this peace, and God never made an empty promise. He never meant for our Christian life to be just an ideal, with no reality to it. He meant for each of us who has confessed faith in Him to experience this “glory in hope of the glory of God.” God has given us commands that, in our own human power, we cannot fulfill. He commands us to “be perfect” (Matt. 5:48), and this is our standard, even though in this life we can never fulfill it. God can command no less than perfection, for He is perfect (Matt. 5:48). Yet in pursuing this standard of perfection, we are comforted to know that God will never give us a promise that He cannot fulfill, and He has promised us that we can be at peace with Him.
Christians throughout history have sought this peace in various ways. In earlier church history some sought it in monasticism or even in ascetic pursuits such as pillar-sitting. Pillar-sitting isn’t much in vogue today, but we see a similar mentality in some things Christians do. When they go to some sort of retreat or Bible conference, even to a place like L’Abri, thinking that here they can find a peace they couldn’t find in their day-to-day Christian life, they escape to their own form of pillar-sitting or mountaintop monasticism. Surely the peace with God that Paul describes is something more than just a weekend retreat experience. As we go on in this chapter, we’ll see that it is very practical in its description of what our Christian life should be. We all know Christians who, very soon after making a profession of faith, seemingly have no joy in their life and have ceased to be a vital part of church life. Perhaps we have been in that situation ourselves. How can the Christian life be a reality, not just a theoretical thing, for us and for our fellow Christians?
The key to answering this question about sanctification is given in these first two verses of chapter 5: “Therefore being justified by faith [in the past], we have peace with God [in the present] through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also we [in the present] have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand.” We are justified by faith. That’s something that has already happened, in the past. But now, in the present, by this same faith, we have access to God’s grace. Once you see that, you have the key to the Christian life.
Salvation, as we have seen, is not only justification. Salvation includes justification, when we accept Jesus as our Savior and therefore become free of our guilt before God. But salvation also includes certain ongoing realities in our present life. Salvation actually takes place in three tenses. In the past tense, it was salvation from the guilt of our sin, which happened when we accepted Jesus as our Savior. In the present tense, it is salvation from the power of sin, which is what the word “sanctification” basically means. The power of sin in its outward appearance and inward ideas is to be broken. Then, in the future tense, in our glorified state in heaven, it will be salvation from the very presence of sin.
How were we justified in the past tense? We were justified by faith. How do we go on now, in the present tense, and enjoy “access” to the wonderful realities that the Bible promises in the present life? We do this “by faith” as well. We “have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand” (verse 2). We know that our justification rested completely upon the finished work of the Lord Jesus, and not in any way upon our own abilities or goodness. What about our sanctification? It, like our justification, rests completely upon Christ’s work, not on ours.
The basis of our sanctification is a major theme in Paul’s letter to the Galatians. He asks, “Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now by faith and not by works going on by works?” (Gal. 3:3). The answer, of course, is a resounding no. Both our beginning as Christians and our perfection as Christians is by faith , not by our own human efforts. When Paul said, in his theme verses (Rom. 1:16-17), that the gospel is “the power of God unto salvation,” he was including salvation in all three of its aspects. For salvation is a running stream, not static. The gospel is the power of God for our salvation from our guilt in justification. But it is also the salvation in our present battles for our sanctification and for our salvation in the redemption of our bodies in glorification. There is a tendency for Christians to talk a great deal about the need to develop Christian character, as though, having accepted Christ as our Savior, we can now begin operating on the basis of our own qualities of character. But if we are expecting to become strong enough on our own to win the battle, we’re never going to win the battle. It’s too much for us.
We need to read our theme passage again, in its entirety: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith” (1:16-17). We are justified by faith, and then, “the just shall live by faith”! Since salvation includes sanctification, we could actually read verse 16 as: “For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto sanctification to everyone that believes.” Whether we are talking about the past, present, or future aspect of salvation, the basis is always the finished work of Christ, and the instrument whereby we lay hold of Christ’s finished work is always faith.
It was a tremendous blessing to my own heart when I began to understand this. You don’t accept Christ as your Savior and then just wait around to go to heaven. There is a present aspect to salvation. Many people have asked me, “But how do I find that reality? I believe all this, but how do I get ahold of it?” And I always emphasize that, somehow or another, we must “jump the fence” from merely giving our mental assent to this idea of sanctification and get hold of it as a reality that we practice day by day. And how do we do this? How do we get hold of the reality of sanctification in our Christian life? We start by remembering how we became Christians in the first place.
Perhaps as we do this it would be helpful to look at justification and sanctification as taking place in three similar steps. There are two necessary steps for a person to accept Christ as Savior, and there’s a third step that is not necessary but that from my own experience is very helpful. The first necessary step in finding salvation is to know and admit that you are a sinner. Nobody accepts Christ as their Savior until he or she knows he or she is a sinner. The second step is, by faith, to actually accept Christ as your Savior by coming under His blood. At that point, your salvation is a finished matter. There are only these two necessary steps.
But my experience is that there’s a third step, one that is not necessary but that is most helpful. The third step, which I have encouraged in my work with the people who come to L’Abri, is to say thank you to God for your salvation. For so many of these new Christians, that’s when the emotion comes. That’s when they experience the reality of it. Of course, someone can be saved without saying thank you, but for many people in our ministry, that’s when the reality has hit home. That’s when they have realized that it’s really done, that they have really laid hold of the finished work of Christ. They have said thank you to God for something that’s total and accomplished. Then comes the peace (5:1).
The same thing applies to sanctification. When you come up against sin in your life, or when you are facing temptation, there are still the two steps that are necessary and the third step that is not necessary but is most helpful. First, you must acknowledge the sin to be sin, just as in justification you had to acknowledge yourself to be a sinner. You will not make real progress in your Christian life unless, whenever you face temptation or whenever you have already given in to temptation, you are quite frank before God and call the sin sin. As long as you just go along and call it all kinds of fancy names and excuse it away, you will never make any progress toward sanctification.
The next step in sanctification, as in justification, is by faith to lay hold of the finished work of Jesus Christ. This is true whether you are facing temptation or after you have already given in to it. First, you admit that you are greatly tempted or that you have already sinned. Then you bring this individual sin under the blood of Christ. “Bringing the sin under Christ’s blood” means that, as soon as you admit your sin, you can have the assurance that your sin is covered by Christ’s blood, just as the little boy in our illustration was completely covered by his father’s overcoat. When God looks at us, He sees only the overcoat; He sees only Christ’s righteousness, only the blood Christ has shed on our behalf. When we bring our sins under the blood of Christ, we are simply claiming the reality of the covering Christ has provided for our sin. And, as with our initial justification, once we have brought each individual sin under Christ’s blood, the matter is finished.
But then, as with justification, there is that third step—a step that is not necessary but that I have found is very helpful. Having admitted your sin and having brought it under the blood of Christ, say thank you. And I think you’ll find that, as soon as you say thank you, the certainty of your forgiveness will come and you will have peace of mind. We Christians tend to put the emphasis on overcoming before we sin, and this is fine. But when we do sin, let’s be first willing to call it sin and then to bring it under the blood of Christ. Then let’s say thank you to God on the basis of His promise that Christ’s blood has covered our sin and that our fellowship with Him is now restored.
I served for many years as a pastor, knowing all the while that there was a vacuum in my preaching. I could tell people how to accept Christ as Savior, we could talk about being in heaven after Jesus came back, but I had very little to tell them about the present aspect of salvation. If we don’t know something of the reality of salvation in our present life, it doesn’t mean that we are lost, but it means that the whole thing takes on an air of unreality. After all, you can talk about being in heaven when you die, but you aren’t in heaven yet. Somehow or other there must be a reality, not in the area of where we are not, but in the area of where we are. Without it our talking becomes just argumentation and unreal to us individually.We have got to get a grasp on how our faith relates to where we are right now.
I can recall times at Thanksgiving services when I would ask a person who had been a Christian for twenty or thirty years to tell the congregation what they were thankful for, and all they could think of was their initial experience of salvation twenty or thirty years ago. That is, of course, something to thank the Lord for; but I would sometimes wonder, don’t we have anything else to add? Don’t we have something to thank the Lord for yesterday, or today? If we don’t, then we have surely fallen into mere orthodoxy, with no reality to it at all.
Many people seem to view the Christian life as though, well, you accept Christ as your Savior, and then you just kind of pull yourself together. “Where’s your Christian character?” they say. “Just be strong.” New Christians may even become involved in witnessing or other kinds of ministry while their own personal lives just kind of die down to a low simmer.
Paul’s answer to this problem of a stagnant Christian life is that, just as faith was the instrument of our receiving justification, so also faith is to be the instrument of our present Christian living. Something he says at the very end of Romans can help us see this: “Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost” (15:13). Without the believing, without the faith, you are not going to abound in hope through the power of the Spirit. There is nothing mechanical about this, but a personal choice to believe. And the Person of the Holy Spirit then will give believers that hope, joy, and peace.
The biblical view is a complete system. Contrary to the twentieth-century view of an impersonal world, the Bible gives us a personal world. There is nothing mechanical about the Christian walk, no way to quantify spiritual reality. It is always a person to person relationship in which we believe God.
Something the apostle John says in his first letter is also helpful. I’ll begin with a verse that I went for years without preaching on: “For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous” (1 John 5:3). John says God’s commandments “are not grievous,” but for many years I found them grievous, and the more grievous I found them, the less I preached on this verse. My difficulty in dealing with this verse was that I was separating it from the next verse: “For whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, our faith” (1 John 5:4).
This is the same thing that Paul is saying in Romans 5:1-2, and we’ll see it is really what he is saying from 5:1 all the way through 8:17. The key to not finding God’s commandments “grievous” is in the victory we experience through our faith. The key is in believing God. The key is in understanding that “the just shall live by faith.” The key is in not trying to live in our own strength, but finding our strength through laying hold of God, through believing God on the basis of the shed blood of the Lord Jesus.
In my own life, there are some sins that seem to crop up again and again. In despair I’ll say, “I’ve done it again!” So what do I do then? I acknowledge the sin. I lay hold of the work of Jesus Christ. I bring that individual sin under the covering of His blood. If, after doing so, my conscience continues to bother me, it is because I am minimizing the validity and the power of Christ’s blood.
Sometimes, in these situations, I have pictured my conscience as a big black dog, jumping up on me with its muddy paws. If I have brought the individual sin under Christ’s blood, and the big black dog of my conscience still jumps up on me with its muddy paws, I must in faith say, “Get down!” I must remind myself of the infinite value of Christ’s blood to cleanse me of all sin. “This is the victory that over-cometh the world, even our faith in relation to temptation before our sin after we fall.” Or as Paul is telling us in 5:1-2, justification comes by faith, and the resulting peace with God also comes by faith.
We find another helpful thought on this matter in Paul’s letter to the Ephesians: “Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked” (6:16). The Greek is actually “of the wicked one,” referring to Satan. What can shield us from Satan’s “fiery darts”? The shield of faith. And what is this faith? It is the same faith that was involved in our justification. It is believing God on the basis of the shed blood of the Lord Jesus. How dare we who have been so marked with sin stand and say, “Now I am a child of God”? We can dare to say this, not through any merit of our own, but because of the saving value of Christ’s blood. As we lay hold of this truth, it is like a giant shield. The first man of ancient times who had a lightweight shield that couldn’t be punched through by arrows had a tremendous advantage in warfare. Likewise, we who are trust ing not in ourselves but in Christ have a tremendous advantage in our battle against sin and temptation with this shield of faith.
Look also at Colossians 2:6-7: “As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him: rooted and built up in him, and stablished in (by) the faith.” How are we going to be rooted and built up in Christ? How are we going to be established in Christ? We do this “in the faith,” or “by faith.”
Paul tells Timothy that his knowledge of “the holy scriptures” can make him “wise [in the present] unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 3:15). If we look to ourselves for sanctification, there can be nothing but sorrow. But we don’t have to look to ourselves. Rather, we look to Scripture and to the Christ revealed therein.
Again, in Hebrews: “For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it” (Heb. 4:2). We looked at this verse once before in relation to justification, but it applies to sanctification as well. God has promised such things as peace and joy to those who have believed Him, but unless we are united to these promises on the basis of Christ’s finished work through faith, they’re not real to us. Faith links us to the promises of God for the present life, just as it did for our initial salvation.
Coming back to Romans 5:1: Having been justified, in the past, we are now, in the present, able to have peace in our hearts. How? By faith. We need to help each other know the reality of this present aspect of salvation. Our peace with God is not just some introspective thing. It is a peace based upon God’s promise that Christ’s atoning death is enough to meet all our present failures. When I became a Christian, I realized that Christ’s blood was enough to cover my past sin. By the same token, I can also know that it is enough to cover the sins I have committed since I awoke this morning. From time to time I do something so bad that I realize that, if it depended on me, I would surely be lost again. When those times come, I must realize that I can bring those things under the shed blood of the Lord Jesus, and that His blood is enough to cleanse me. Then I can simply say thank you. This is the source of peace in the Christian’s heart. It isn’t just an emotional experience. It doesn’t require sitting on a pillar or going to a Bible retreat every other weekend. It’s the objective reality of the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, applied to our present necessity in day by day, moment by moment cleansing.
Someone might ask, “How often can we do this? How often can we claim forgiveness for these endless daily sins?” We can do so as often as we need to. When Peter asked Christ, “How often shall I forgive my brother?” Christ said, “Not seven times, but seventy times seven” (Matt. 18:22). If we humans are supposed to forgive each other that often, surely God’s forgiveness of us is infinitely greater. How often should we ask His forgiveness? As often as we need to!
Someone might object: Doesn’t this do discredit to the work of the Lord Jesus, to fall into temptation and an hour later to fall into the same temptation—and both times to “bring it under the blood of Jesus?” Doesn’t this trivialize Christ’s work? Quite the contrary, there is really only one thing that can minimize Christ’s saving work, and that is our failing to lay hold of it.
I’m convinced from watching other Christians and reading about Christians through the centuries, and through personal experience, that this is when we begin to make our forward steps as Christians: When I know through experience that I can lay hold of Christ’s blood by faith to cover my sins this morning, and then to cover my sins this afternoon, even if they’re the same sins—when I know this, the preciousness of Christ’s blood becomes a tremendous reality. I begin to live in the light of His presence and in the light of His work—not just in the past or in the future, but in the present. I begin to live in the reality of the supernatural world.
Some would teach that once a person is truly a Christian he is perfect in this life, but the Bible doesn’t teach this. A true Christian is not someone who is in any sense approaching moral perfection; rather, a true Christian is that person who knows, by experience, the ever-present wonder of being able to lay hold of the blood of Jesus and then being able to say thank you, knowing that his or her fellowship with God is completely restored.
Look at Hebrews 13:21 where the writer tells us that we are made perfect through Jesus Christ, not in our own strength. Our conscious side is to act through faith in the victory of Jesus Christ. Peter also echoes Paul’s teaching concerning the place of faith in the believer’s life. He speaks of those “who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Pet. 1:5). Peter seems to be focusing on the future aspect of salvation, but he has in view its present aspect as well, as he agrees with Paul that it is God’s power that “keeps” us, and that we appropriate that power “through faith.”
Look also at the very striking language of John in Revelation 12: “And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren [Satan] is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb” (Rev. 12:10-11a). This isn’t just a pretty story, and it wasn’t just put in the Bible to fill space. It is our present reality as Christians. Whenever the devil accuses us, we overcome him by the blood of the Lamb. There’s only one way to keep from giving in to temptation, and that is by the blood of the Lamb. Or as we heard John say elsewhere, “This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith” (1 John 5:4).
We are born again through faith, but our faith shouldn’t stop there. In a sense, every moment of our lives is to be lived at the point of our spiritual birth. When we were born again, God removed our guilt once and for all on the basis of the finished work of the Lord Jesus, when by faith we believed God. Faith does not have value; it is the instrument. The value lies only in the finished work of Jesus. As we go on in the Christian life, in a sense we are to keep on experiencing that initial moment of forgiveness. We believed God in the moment of salvation; let’s keep right on believing Him. We trusted in the finished work of the Lord Jesus in that moment; let’s keep right on trusting in it. This is not mechanical in any way. God deals with us as moral, rational creatures, who must believe and trust God.
Therefore being justified [in the past] by faith, we have [in the pres-ent] peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ: by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we [in the present] stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. (5:1-2)
Have we looked at these two verses long enough? Is it time to move on? In a way, as Christians, we never move beyond these two verses. From now until Jesus comes back again or we die, this is where we live. In a broader sense, this is true of all of Romans 5:1—8:17. From the time we accept Christ as our Savior until we die or until Christ comes back, we live in this part of Romans.
Some Christians teach what they call the “second blessing,” or the “baptism of the Holy Spirit,” which they say takes place subsequent to the time when you accept Jesus as your Savior. They teach correctly that you are justified when you accept Christ as your Savior; but they say that, at some subsequent time, you can experience a second work of grace. The Bible doesn’t teach any such thing. The Bible says that when you have accepted Christ as your Savior, you are indwelt by the Holy Spirit. No “second work of grace” is needed. Sadly, however, many Christians go a lifetime and never learn the reality of the principle I am talking about. Many Christians who could tell you that salvation is only on the basis of Christ’s finished work, nevertheless try to live their lives in their own strength. They don’t seem to know that there is also a life on that same basis.
I have known many Christians who for twenty years or more have carried the weight of some terrible sin. They have worried about it every day of their life. They have become hamstrung in their Christian living by the weight of one sin. But this isn’t the way it is supposed to be. When I have sinned, I am to be sorry for it. Then I bring it under the blood of Christ. And then I can say, “Thank You that it is forgiven.” If that terrible sin involved injury to someone else, we should go back and try to pick up the pieces. We should make restitution as best we can. That should not, however, prevent us from claiming the full forgiveness available to us through Christ. Suppose you have committed some terrible sin, and it comes to your mind many times a day, and each time it does you thank God again for your forgiveness. Saying thank you many times is a lot better than bearing the burden. And saying thank you is the only correct response, if we truly believe that the finished work of Christ has justified us and can also sanctify us.
In this constant attitude of thanksgiving for our continual cleansing from sin, we can truly begin to experience the moment-by-moment reality of our faith. A key to knowing this reality is in becoming increasingly sensitive to our sin and then quickly bringing it under Christ’s blood. For a certain period of my own life I did something that I found very helpful: I carried a piece of paper in my pocket, and as soon as I did something I knew to be wrong, I wrote it on this piece of paper. Then I thanked God for His forgiveness. Then, in a column on the right-hand side of the paper, I put a check mark, in the knowledge that that particular sin was gone. I don’t know if that method would help you, but it was a great blessing to my own soul to see those check marks come on down the page in a day or a week, because this is where a Christian ought to be living.
As Christians, we should be living in sensitivity to the sins in our lives, but we shouldn’t be carrying the burden of those sins for fifteen or twenty years after we have confessed them. Ideally, as Christians, we should have nothing on our conscience because, as soon as we sin, we bring that sin under Christ’s blood. We shouldn’t wait around for an hour, and we shouldn’t wait around for a week. We shouldn’t play with our sin, nor should we bear it in agony. As soon as we sin, we should quickly bring it under Christ’s blood. And after we have done that, the sin is gone.
Someone might say, “Won’t this just cause you to sin more?” I can say for myself that, through the years, this process of confession of sin and then thanksgiving for forgiveness has helped me to move slightly in the other direction. Only slightly, I’m sure, but at least slightly. What leads us to sin more is becoming hard and insensitive to the sin. Confessing each sin, and thanking God for our forgiveness, leads in the opposite direction—away from sin.
And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience. (5:3)
Paul has just talked about “rejoicing in hope of the glory of God.” That may be easy enough to do when things are going well in our Christian lives or while we are enjoying fellowship with other Christians; but then we leave the circle of fellowship and hit a wall and bruise our nose. At that point we must ask ourselves, Was this all just a pep talk, or is it the truth? Is Christianity just a psychological thing, or is it real? If Christianity is dealing with truth, it has to deal with truth not just in the first glow of new faith, but in the everyday problems of my life after I’ve become a Christian. If the Christian faith is more than just a pep talk, it has to relate somehow to the particular rough-and-tumble of each Christian’s life. Remember that “shield of faith” we read about in Ephesians? The question before us is, can each of us, individually, be confident that our shield of faith won’t be punctured by the latest variety of arrow the enemy throws at us? Do these shields of faith work only when we’re in a safe place with other Christians, or do they work out there in the rough-and-tumble of everyday life?
In 5:3, Paul says our faith does work out there in the rough-and-tumble: “Not only so, but we glory in tribulations also.” “Tribulations” is that rough-and-tumble of life. It doesn’t refer only to physical persecution. As it happens, however, the Christians Paul was writing to in Rome were in fact facing real physical persecutions. What was the secret of their strength? It was what we’ve been talking about. It was faith: what they believed about God, history, and their own situation before God. Can you imagine the Roman Christians as they were being led to the Coliseum, simply slapping each other on the shoulder and saying, “Courage, man! Courage!” That’s pretty poor stuff when you’re facing a lion.
Our faith is not just a theoretical thing. It is faith amid temptation. It is faith amid tribulation. It is faith amid the rough-and-tumble of life. What is the rough-and-tumble of your life? What challenges do you face? Whatever they are, whether they include eventual martyrdom or whether they involve something more “prosaic” such as bearing the scorn of nonbelieving friends and relatives, whatever your particular challenges are, your faith in Christ is sufficient to meet them. “And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also,” because we walk by faith.
. . . knowing that tribulation worketh patience. (5:3b)
In one of his psalms, David writes, “I waited patiently for the LORD” (Ps. 40:1). The Hebrew is stronger: “In waiting I waited for the LORD.” There are two ways to wait. You can “wait waiting,” or you can wait not waiting. You can wait with an attitude of waiting on and trusting in the Lord, or you can wait impatiently. I’ll have to admit that a lot of my own waiting is of this second sort, either waiting impatiently or else waiting with a fatalistic attitude of, “Well, that’s just the way life is.” But Paul tells us that if we learn to trust the Lord, we can learn true patience; we can learn how to wait waiting.
. . . knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope: and hope maketh not ashamed. (5:3b-5a)
This “hope maketh not ashamed” takes us all the way back to our theme verses, where Paul says that he is “not ashamed of the gospel of Christ” (1:16). There, as we noted, Paul is saying that he is not ashamed of the gospel as a belief system that he then lays out. He is not ashamed of it amid the Greek intellectual world or amid Rome’s imperial might. Here in 5:5, however, he is saying that he is not disappointed in the past nor in the present tribulation. He is proud of the gospel because of the great hope it has given him; it is a hope that has not disappointed him, and therefore a hope of which he need never be ashamed.
Just how did it come about that Paul’s hope did not disappoint him or make him ashamed?
And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. (5:5b)
Our present state of not being ashamed or disappointed is based upon two past objective facts: the fact that Christ died for us; the fact that the Holy Spirit has come to live within us. Christ has died. The price for our sins is paid. And now God Himself, in the form of the Holy Spirit, indwells us. These two things are not just subjective ideas, they are objectively true. They are as objectively true as when the moon comes out at night. The death of Jesus is objectively real, and our being indwelt by the Holy Spirit is objectively real. Both realities are the work of God, not the result or goal of our own efforts. Amid tribulation, this reality is there, but you’ve got to lay hold of it by faith. And Paul wants to assure you that, just as you need never be ashamed of the gospel as a belief system (1:16), you also need never be ashamed of or disappointed in your practice of living by faith. This was Paul’s message, and this is to be our calling as twentieth-century Christians. We are to proclaim the system clearly and without shame (1:16), and we are also to be living demonstrations that these things are real (5:5). No matter how perfect the system, unless there’s some demonstration that it is real, we can’t expect people to believe it. Our goal should be that people won’t just hear our message and say, “Yes, that’s the way it should be,” but that they will see the peace of God in our hearts and say, “Yes, that’s the way it is!” The peace of God is not a mystical thing on top of a pillar or at a Bible conference, but the reality of the finished work of Jesus in the midst of history.
This is the first time since 1:4 that Paul has mentioned the Holy Spirit. He will mention Him again in 7:6, and then in chapter 8 he will have a great deal to say about the power of the Holy Spirit in the life of the believer. The giving of the Holy Spirit is just as real and objective as the death of Christ for our salvation.
For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. (5:6)
“In due time [in the past] Christ died for the ungodly.” Paul is continuing to call us to understand our present reality as Christians in the light of the past reality of Christ’s finished work. In so doing he is once again beginning to develop the theme of death versus life, which we saw in 1:17 and again in 4:17. Christ died for the ungodly.
For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (5:7-8)
People often say, “But what can Christ do for me? I’m such a sinner.” Or, “What can Christ do for me? I’ve sinned again.” Paul answers that question: When did Christ die for us? When we were still sinners! All of us, no matter how long we have been Christians, need to be reminded of this. I certainly need to be reminded of it. When I’ve fallen again, when I’ve sinned again, when I’ve done something wrong and think, “Surely, as long as I’ve been a Christian, I shouldn’t have done that” . . . at such times, I need help. And my help at such times comes from remembering the basis upon which my salvation rests. Who was this Francis Schaeffer for whom Jesus died? When I honestly answer that question, and remember the kind of person I was when Jesus died for me, surely I won’t continue to be discouraged or to think that He will abandon me now.
Someone might be reading Romans and say, Paul has lost his outline! He already explained justification in the earlier chapters. Why is he bringing it up now? But Paul hasn’t lost his outline at all, for the present reality of our peace with God (5:1-11) is based entirely upon the finished work of Christ on our behalf (3:21—4:25). Whenever I sin, whenever I lose my sense of peace with God, what is the one thing that can comfort me? The one comforting and overwhelming fact is that, when I was totally a sinner, without strength and without one good thing to commend me to God, it was then that Jesus died for me.
“For scarcely for a righteous man will one die.” You can find a few cases where people died for nice people, but who dies for the awful scoundrel? Who dies for the enemy? Well, who was the enemy? I was! I was the enemy of God. I was stamping through God’s universe, shaking my fist in His face. And in the very moment when I was shaking my fist in God’s face and tramping through the Creator’s universe, muddying all His streams, that’s when Jesus died for me. And if this is when Jesus died for me, what hope it gives me now! Now, even when I fall, the blood of Jesus is enough. He didn’t save me because I was strong; He saved me when I was weak. He didn’t save me when I was a pretty thing; He saved me when I was a mess. On the basis of this reality, I can have comfort.
When we as Christians sin, we can react in one of three ways: 1) We can become hardened to our sin. 2) We can sink into utter despair and say, “It’s all over.” And as I’ve said, I’ve known Christians who have spent twenty years despairing over one sin. But neither of these reactions is right. The only right course of action for us as Christians is to 3) become increasingly sensitive to our sin, but also increasingly to know the forgiveness that is ours on the basis of the blood of Christ—to have the assurance that, if Jesus died for me as I was before my salvation, how much He must love me now!
Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. (5:9)
Justification is our reality in the present tense, based on the fact that, at some particular time in the past tense, Jesus died for us and we accepted His death on our behalf and therefore we became justified. Paul is giving us a complete picture of salvation. On the basis of this past and present reality we will, in the future, “be saved from wrath through him.”
For if, when we were yet enemies . . . (5:10a)
“While we were yet sinners . . .” (verse 8), and now, “When we were yet enemies.” How strong do we want Paul to make it? Hasn’t he emphasized this enough already? But do you see why he is stressing this? He is anticipating how some of his readers will react. He isn’t dealing with theoretical arguments; he’s dealing with living flesh-and-blood people just like you and me. He has said, “Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God,” and he knows many of his readers will become very exhilarated about this. But then they will go down the stairs and, bam! they fall into sin again and are plunged into the darkest despair. Paul knows that he isn’t dealing with ideal people. He’s dealing with us! The church at Rome had the same experiences we have. Paul doesn’t just want to offer us good psychology. He wants us to understand that our Christian faith has reality for our everyday personal lives. The gospel isn’t for ideal people. Ideal people don’t exist. The gospel is for people like us.
For if, when were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son . . . (5:10a)
Once again, note the tenses. Everything turns on the tenses. In the past tense, in real history, Jesus died. In the past tense, we accepted Him as our Savior and thus were reconciled to God and became indwelt by the Holy Spirit. On the basis of those events in the past tense, we can have hope in the present tense.
For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. (5:10)
Verses 9 and 10 are very similar: “Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him” (verse 9). “Much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life” (verse 10). But notice the new element in verse 10: Paul has been talking about Christ’s death, but now, at the end of verse 10, he reminds us that Christ isn’t dead—He’s alive! If, when we were enemies, Jesus died for us, what will this living Christ do for us now!
We were dead, but now we’re alive. Abraham believed that God could bring life out of the dead (4:20-21). We believe that God raised Jesus from the dead (4:23-25). On the basis of Christ’s work on our behalf, and through our faith in His work, we’re alive (chapters 5—8). And Jesus is alive (5:10). If Jesus died for us while we were enemies and now He’s alive, what will He do for us now! We’re dealing with a living Christ. He is there. The physical resurrection of Jesus is a historical fact. We’re not just dealing with an idea. Jesus is the ascended, living Christ.
Paul carries this life and death theme throughout the chapter. We “shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ” (5:17); God’s grace will “reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord” (5:21). Jesus died for us; it is a finished work. He died for us while we were yet sinners, while we were God’s enemies. “How much more,” then, in the present life, having accepted Christ as our Savior, and having a living Savior . . . how much more can we expect to have everything we need for our present life!
And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement. (5:11)
At this present moment of time, “we glory in God through our Lord Jesus Christ,” and this is on the basis of something we acquired in the past: “. . . by whom we have now received the atonement.” This always reminds me of the Twenty-third Psalm, where in verses 5 and 6 David carries us from the present to the future: “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.” David had great joy, even on the battlefields of the present; and this great joy was based on his certain hope for the future: “Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.” Our faith in Christ brings blessings not just in the past and future, but in this present life as well. It brings the oil of gladness amid the battles of life. Our justification was on the basis of Christ’s finished work, and our present life is to be lived on the same basis. We have a right to lay hold upon the things of God on the basis of Christ’s work on Calvary. We can do so with overwhelming confidence. Christ has paid the price. We have a living Savior. Christ has finished the work. Through His finished work there is the possibility of glorying in God amid life’s struggles. Each of us has our individual temptations; each of us falls. But the cleansing is always there. We need never, never be afraid that we have fallen to the place where God will turn away from us. Through Christ, forgiveness always awaits us if we confess our sin and bring it under the covering of His shed blood. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, amid the rough-and-tumble, we can have strength.
People often say to me, “I don’t know if I would have the strength to be a martyr.” Of course we don’t have such strength at this moment; but at the moment of the martyrdom, whether it is physical death or the little deaths of being scoffed at and turned away from by our family and loved ones—even amid these little deaths, on the basis of Christ’s finished work and through the means of our faith, we can glory in God.
Paul is emphasizing over and over again the two steps, and they’re not to be confused: There is the past step that was once for all accomplished in the death of Jesus and then in our individually accepting Him as Savior, leading to our justification. Then there is this present step of coming to know the power and joy of God in our lives, and it is on the same basis as our initial salvation: “through our Lord Jesus Christ” (5:11).