Year 2, Day 28: Romans 5

Peace With God

Keep in mind that the book of Romans reads much like a logical argument or even a legal brief.  In Romans 1-3, Paul has made his case already that nobody is righteous {with or without the Law}.  Then, in Romans 4, Paul made the case that the only way that any of us are righteous is through Jesus Christ and the righteousness that He brought to the table for us.  Now Paul will make the case that if we are indeed resting in the promise of righteousness gained through Christ, then we have peace and hope with God.  This is the thrust of chapter 5.

Grace Abounds

Here is the point of the first 11 verses: if God saw fit to save us when we were full of sin, then how much more we should know the life that comes in God now that we have been saved through Jesus Christ.  At first, that sentence feels very much like a “well, duh!” kind of sentence.  But I’m not trying to be Captain Obvious here.  I really want us to look deeply into what Paul is saying and make sure that we actually do get what Paul is saying.  If we really get it, then we should really be living it out, too, right?

You see, what Paul is saying is that if we really believe that we are saved through Jesus Christ and through nothing of our own action, our lives should be different.  If we really are saved in the midst of our sinfulness, then we should be a new creation!  We shouldn’t simply acknowledge our salvation before God.  We shouldn’t simply talk about the day when God will make us a new person.  We should be that new person right here and right now.  If God can see it fit to save us while we are still in sin, God can see fit to change what we even while we are in these fleshly and corruptible bodies.

Sure, we are not perfect.  We will always be tempted by the pull of sin for as long as we live here in this world.  And yes, there will come a day when we are resurrected in new bodies with a pure heart.  But we do not have to wait to experience that feeling.  We can be changed here and now.  After all, suffering brings about endurance, endurance produces character, and character brings us into hope.  We may not be perfect now, but we can indeed know the hope that is in God right here and right now.

Adam and Christ

Having made this trio of theological assertions {all are condemned, Romans 1-3; righteousness only  comes through Christ, Romans 4; and the righteous have hope and peace with God, Romans 5} Paul now sets up the case.  Sin came through one man: Adam.  Once sin entered the world, it infected everything and everyone.  Death became the natural end of life in spite of the fact that life was not designed to end in a perfect world. 

But if sin came through one man, then it also makes sense that righteousness should come through one man: Jesus Christ.  Now that righteousness has entered the world, it too can infect everyone.  Although death is the now the natural end of life, through Jesus Christ death is no longer the final word.  Death may be the end of life, but eternal life with God is now the final word.  Death came through human sinfulness; true life comes through the righteousness of God through the God-made-man.

In fact, there is a neat little comparison that Paul does here in this chapter.  He makes the following argument: Judgment follows even one act of sin; righteousness follows even one great act of righteousness {Specifically, the one act of Christ upon the cross.}  Another neat way of thinking about this is: One single act of sin brought many trespasses, yet many trespasses were forgiven through one single act of righteousness.  Both of these arguments follow from Paul’s words, and both of these arguments show the consistency of God’s character in both judgment and forgiveness.

Repetition

As we read through these concluding verses we come back around full circle to where I began this particular blog post.  But before we go there, did you notice all the repetition in this chapter?  The word “one” is repeated eleven times.  The word “reign” is repeated five times.  The phrase “much more” is repeated five times.  Clearly what we have going on here is the assertion that what is gained through the reign of one Jesus is much more than what was lost through the reign of the sin of one Adam.

Full Circle

Now how does that bring us back full circle?  Well, if we believe what this chapter says, then those in Christ should be “much more” than we were before we were in Christ.  We may not be made perfect and unblemished, but we are still part of the kingdom of heaven and Jesus’ Christ’s reign here on earth.  We should be different.  Those in Christ should absolutely be much more than what we were before we received the gift of grace that comes through Christ’s death for us.  If we believe the faith, then shouldn’t we be living the faith, too?

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