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Verse-by-Verse Bible Commentary
Romans 5:1

Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,
New American Standard Bible

Bible Study Resources

Concordances:
Nave's Topical Bible - Assurance;   Atonement;   Catholicity;   Faith;   Jesus Continued;   Justification;   Peace;   Propitiation;   Reconciliation;   Righteousness;   Salvation;   Thompson Chain Reference - Faith;   Faith-Unbelief;   Justification;   Peace;   Rest-Unrest;   Righteousness;   Torrey's Topical Textbook - Anger of God, the;   Assurance;   Faith;   Hope;   Justification before God;   Peace, Spiritual;   Reconciliation with God;  
Dictionaries:
American Tract Society Bible Dictionary - Adam;   Justificiation;   Bridgeway Bible Dictionary - Assurance;   Faith;   Hope;   Joy;   Justification;   Paul;   Peace;   Reconciliation;   Righteousness;   Salvation;   Baker Evangelical Dictionary of Biblical Theology - Death of Christ;   Justification;   Mediator, Mediation;   Micah, Theology of;   Peace;   Reconciliation;   Salvation;   Thessalonians, First and Second, Theology of;   Charles Buck Theological Dictionary - Atonement;   Imputation;   Intercession of Christ;   Joy;   Judgment, Last;   Justification;   Law;   Man;   Pardon;   Peace;   Easton Bible Dictionary - Faith;   Justification;   Fausset Bible Dictionary - Canticles;   ;   Faith;   Hebrews, the Epistle to the;   Justification;   Romans, the Epistle to the;   Shalamite;   Holman Bible Dictionary - Access;   Faith;   Justification;   Lord;   Peace, Spiritual;   Reconcilation;   Romans, Book of;   Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible - Ethics;   Grace;   Hope;   Justification, Justify;   Peace;   Person of Christ;   Romans, Epistle to the;   Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament - Access ;   Ethics;   Grace;   Guilt (2);   Justification;   Justification (2);   Mediation Mediator;   Parousia;   Paul (2);   Peace;   Peace (2);   Perseverance;   Personality;   Presence;   Reconciliation;   Regeneration;   Righteousness;   Romans Epistle to the;   Sacrifices ;   Salvation Save Saviour;   Trust;   Unity;   Morrish Bible Dictionary - Covenant, the New;   Lord;   Peace;   People's Dictionary of the Bible - Justification;  
Encyclopedias:
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia - Adoption;   Chronology of the New Testament;   Forgiveness;   Games;   Have;   Jesus Christ (Part 1 of 2);   Justification;   Peace;   Propitiation;   Reconcile;   Salvation;  
Devotionals:
Daily Light on the Daily Path - Devotion for June 27;   Every Day Light - Devotion for November 28;  
Unselected Authors

Clarke's Commentary

CHAPTER V.

The effects of justification by faith, peace with God, 1.

The joyous hope of eternal glory, 2.

Glorying in tribulations, 3.

And gaining thereby patience, experience, and hope, 4.

And having the love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy

Spirit, 5.

The state of the world when Christ died for it, 6-10.

Jesus Christ is an atonement, 11.

Sin and death entered into the world by Adam's transgression,

and all became guilty before God, 12-14.

God's grace in sending Christ into the world to save fallen man,

15-19.

The law is brought in to show the exceeding sinfulness of sin,

20.

The grace of Christ is to be as extensive in its influences and

reign, as sin has been in its enslaving and destructive nature,

21.

NOTES ON CHAP. V.

Is the former chapter, the apostle, having proved that the believing Gentiles are justified in the same way with Abraham, and are, in fact, his seed, included with him in the promise and covenant; he judged this a proper place, as the Jews built all their glorying upon the Abrahamic covenant, to produce some of the chief of those privileges and blessings in which the Christian Gentile can glory, in consequence of his justification by faith. And he produces three particulars which, above all others, were adapted to this purpose.

1. The hope of eternal life, in which the law, wherein the Jew gloried, Romans 2:17, was defective, Romans 5:2.

2. The persecutions and sufferings to which Christians were exposed, Romans 5:3; Romans 5:4, and on account of which the Jews were greatly prejudiced against the Christian profession: but he shows that these had a happy tendency to establish the heart in the hope of the Gospel.

3. An interest in God, as our GOD and FATHER-a privilege upon which the Jews valued themselves highly above all nations, Romans 5:11.

These three are the singular privileges belonging to the Gospel state, wherein true Christians may glory, as really belonging to them, and greatly redounding, if duly understood and improved, to their honour and benefit.

Verse Romans 5:1. Therefore being justified by faith — The apostle takes it for granted that he has proved that justification is by faith, and that the Gentiles have an equal title with the Jews to salvation by faith. And now he proceeds to show the effects produced in the hearts of the believing Gentiles by this doctrine. We are justified-have all our sins pardoned by faith, as the instrumental cause; for, being sinners, we have no works of righteousness that we can plead.

We have peace with God — Before, while sinners, we were in a state of enmity with God, which was sufficiently proved by our rebellion against his authority, and our transgression of his laws; but now, being reconciled, we have peace with God. Before, while under a sense of the guilt of sin, we had nothing but terror and dismay in our own consciences; now, having our sin forgiven, we have peace in our hearts, feeling that all our guilt is taken away. Peace is generally the first-fruits of our justification.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ — His passion and death being the sole cause of our reconciliation to God.

Bibliographical Information
Clarke, Adam. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "The Adam Clarke Commentary". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​acc/​romans-5.html. 1832.

Bridgeway Bible Commentary


The believer’s assurance (5:1-11)

When God justifies people (declares them to be righteous, or puts them right with him), he brings them into a relationship of peace with himself. In his grace he accepts them into his holy presence, and assures them of one day sharing his glory (5:1-2). Believers’ anticipation of future glory is what the Bible calls hope. Hope in this sense is not a mere wish for something, but the expectation of something that is certain. It is an assured belief that enables believers to persevere through difficulties, and in the process develop Christian character. They have purpose and confidence in this perseverance because the love of God fills their hearts through the Holy Spirit (3-5).
This same love caused Jesus Christ to give his life for sinners. We may at times hear of someone who would give his life for a good person, but Christ died for those who are bad. He died for sinners (6-8). In his death Jesus bore the full wrath of God so that sinners might escape it and be reconciled to God. But Jesus triumphed over death, so that those whom he reconciles are guaranteed a victorious salvation, both in the present life and in the life to come (9-11).

Bibliographical Information
Flemming, Donald C. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Fleming's Bridgeway Bible Commentary". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​bbc/​romans-5.html. 2005.

Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible

Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Justified by faith … has invariably the meaning of "justified by an obedient faith," as in the case of Abraham. See the preceding chapter. Also, for further explanation of this synecdoche, see under Romans 3:22. Both at the beginning and ending of Romans, Paul defined "faith" in the sense of its being "the obedience of faith"; and although this has been cited before, the extravagant and vociferous claims to the effect that Paul really meant "faith only" require repeated attention to the truth. Note:

Through whom we received grace and apostleship, unto obedience of faith among all the nations, for his name’s sake (Romans 1:5).

But now is manifested, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the eternal God, is made known unto all nations unto obedience of faith (Romans 16:26).

It would be impossible to overestimate the significance of Paul’s placement of these two verses, situated like the lions on each side of the throne of Solomon, standing as the Alpha and the Omega, guarding the portals of this great treatise of God’s righteousness, but necessarily dealing with justification by faith, and making sure that "he who runs may read" and not be deceived as to the degree of faith Paul was discussing. One may not enter or leave this epistle without confronting the fact that it was "the obedience of faith" which summed up the end and all of Paul’s apostleship (Rom. 5:1:5), and that it is "the obedience of faith" of all nations which enables them to participate in redemption (Romans 16:26). Thus, "obedience of faith" must be understood as included in Paul’s salvation "by faith." The following example from Paul’s writings shows how and when faith makes one a child of God:

For ye are all sons of God, through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ did put on Christ (Galatians 3:26-27).

Thus, faith saves one by leading him to accept forgiveness of sins in God’s appointed institution, the spiritual body of Christ; and salvation is accomplished when faith becomes obedient to the degree of causing him to be baptized into Christ, and to put on Christ. As Lipscomb expressed it:

To be saved through faith in Christ Jesus, to be baptized unto the remission of sins, to be baptized into Christ, and to put on Christ, all mean exactly the same thing. David Lipscomb, Commentary on the New Testament Epistles (Nashville: Gospel Advocate Company, 1969), p. 92.

Even in the very epistle we are studying, and where so many allegations to the contrary are allegedly grounded, Paul went so far as to define exactly the point in the time sequence of the believer’s obedient actions when his salvation actually occurs. Thus:

But God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Being THEN made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteousness (Romans 6:17-18 KJV).

The omission of "then" in some of the translations does not remove the meaning, for it is implied anyway; and even Phillips retained it in his rendition. Thus, a man is saved "by faith" WHEN he obeys the gospel, and not before. It is not amiss, then, to declare unequivocally that baptism for the remission of sins on the part of a true and penitent believer is salvation "by faith." If that is not true, how could Christ have said, "He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved" (Mark 16:16)?

We have peace with God … should read "Let us have peace with God," according to many scholars; and that rendition is given as an alternate reading in the English Revised Version (1885) margin. The difference turns upon two very similar Greek words, [@echomen] and [@echoomen], the latter meaning "we have," and the other meaning "let us have." The scholars assure us that the preponderance of manuscript authority favors the first, "let us have"; and Lenski went so far as to say:

The assertion that textual authority for "we have" is also good is not true. … A number of expedients are advanced in order to justify the use of the indicative ("we have"), such as that, when speaking, Paul had in mind the short vowel, but that his amanuensis Tertius wrote the long vowel by mistake. "The sense must conquer the letter," we are told; but the letter alone conveys the sense, and we change the sense when we change the letter. R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 333.

Lenski’s comment is introduced here because of the clear and forceful way in which he emphasized that what the holy writers said, the actual letter of what we have received from them, must take precedence over what any man thinks they might have meant! The application of this principle will resolve the question of "faith" vs. "faith only," since it was of "faith" that Paul wrote, and never of "faith only," the latter being urged as Paul’s "meaning," even by Lenski!

The decision of whether "we have" or "let us have" is correct cannot logically be attempted by this writer. In any event, the difference is of no consequence either way; and thus. after noting what appears to be a valid objection against the rendition in both KJV and English Revised Version (1885) in this instance, the sentence will be discussed as it stands in those versions, since that is the text which most people have.

Peace with God … means that the fierce rebellion against God is no longer within the heart; the war is over, and man has submitted to his Maker; and the ensuing new status changes everything. God is angry with the wicked every day; and Paul described the Gentiles in their state of rebellion as "children of wrath." That wrath pertains to every man who has not come into the inheritance of peace with God in Christ. It was to that peace which Augustine referred when he said, "Thou, O God, hast touched me and translated me into thy peace!"

CHRIST AND MAN’S PEACE

Peace is the great legacy of Christ to them that love and obey him. In the annunciation, the angels brought word of "peace on earth to men of good will" (Luke 2:10); Zacharias prophesied of the Dayspring from on high who would "guide our feet into the way of peace" (Luke 1:79); and Paul spoke of the "joy and peace in believing" (Romans 15:13). Jesus said:

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give unto you, not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid (John 14:27).

This peace, like every other spiritual blessing, is in Christ (Ephesians 1:3), a thought also expressed thus:

And the peace of God that passeth understanding, shall guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus (Philippians 4:7).

This marvelous peace is exactly the blessing which troubled man most needs and so incessantly seeks, even if his seeking is but an unfulfilled subconscious longing after it. The insatiable desire for that heavenly peace is never abated until people rest in Christ. In the great invitation (Matthew 11:28-30), Jesus spoke of the rest people would find and of the rest that he would give; and both are what Paul referred to here (Romans 5:1). Despite the eternal truth that no worthwhile peace may be procured by means of any human device, people are, nevertheless, in constant pursuit of it, employing all kinds of strategies in their sad efforts to possess it; and, no matter how frequently time has demonstrated the ineffectiveness of one device or another, people still strive in the same old discredited ways to establish their peace, overlooking the availability of this dearest of all possessions as a free gift from God in Christ.

Note the various ways in which people strive vainly for that peace, a peace which God is willing and ready to give them when they turn to him: (1) People seek peace by moving to the suburbs, planting a garden, and building a hedge, only to discover that peace is not a commodity that any realtor can sell. (2) Some seek it by going to a psychiatrist, only to learn that no psychiatrist can convey to another the peace that he does not himself possess. (3) Some seek peace through the ardent advocacy of this or that social system, or by participation in campaigns for the alleviation of alleged human woes; but it would be just as reasonable to suppose that one could cure twenty cases of measles by putting them all in the same room, as it is to suppose that any scheme for better housing, for example, could cure the agony of human beings whose wretchedness is due to their sin and not to their circumstances. The savage tides which swell and flow in the hearts of millions of unregenerated people will never yield to the magic of some political solution, nor disappear through any readjustment of earth’s material wealth. (4) Others seek peace by means of the bottle, the needle, and the pillbox; but the reliance upon such pitiful devices cannot evoke some miraculous genie, as in Moslem mythology, that can pour the oil of peace upon the turbulent waters of the raging storms that trouble the hearts of people. Alcohol, narcotics, and drugs produce death instead of life, hell instead of heaven, agony instead of peace. (5) Still others seek peace through the pursuit of the pleasures of life, only to find as sage, philosopher, and poet alike have found, that peace comes not from pleasures.

But pleasures are like poppies spread, You seize the flower, its bloom is shed; Or like the snow falls in the river, A moment white, then melts forever. Robert Burns, Tam O’Shanter, stanza 7.

Alexander Maclaren said:

Sooner or later, the mad, whirling dervish of life will slow down, falter, and grind to an irresistible stop, where the facts of unrest and soul disquietude must inevitably be faced. Alexander Maclaren, origin of this quotation unknown.

(6) And some even think to find peace by means of human achievement; but efficacy for the impartation of peace to the. human soul is not found in any such device. Alexander of Macedon found only dust and ashes at the end of that rainbow, and so will any other who follows that illusion to its wretched end. (7) Yet another device has commended itself, throughout history as being a source of peace for troubled people. It is a sacerdotal arrangement, in which a human contemporary is given a special kind of education, a special kind of garb, and a special kind of dignity in which such a one is elevated to a position of alleged sanctity, and then commissioned as an agent to procure peace and grant it to his fellow mortals. Thousands of years of the use of this elaborate device have demonstrated, alas, that sacerdotal man is no holier than ourselves and no more able to procure peace than others. It is time that people should be reminded again that:

There is one God and one mediator between God and men, himself also man, Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all (1 Timothy 2:5).

As for the old superstition that any man can absolve another of his sins and impart any peace worth having, it is hereby affirmed in the light of that Word that liveth for ever and ever, that the scriptures teach no such thing. "Only God can forgive sins"! (Mark 2:5).

Through our Lord Jesus Christ … The way of receiving that peace is plain. The source is Jesus Christ. It may not be procured, therefore, through people. Inscribed upon the north facade of the impressive tomb of William Rockefeller in Tarrytown cemetery, Tarrytown, New York, are these words of Augustine:

OUR HEARTS, O GOD, WERE MADE FOR THEE; AND NEVER SHALL THEY REST UNTIL THEY REST IN THEE.

How may people possess that peace of God through Christ? By means of the obedience of faith so perfectly expounded by Paul in Romans. Atheism is no refuge for the soul. Even the great achievers among the ranks of atheists, such as H. G. Wells, have confessed that peace is no part of their endowment. Wells declared:

I cannot adjust my life to secure any fruitful peace. … Here I am at sixty-five still seeking for peace … that dignified peace is just a hopeless dream. H. G. Wells, quoted by Wilbur M. Smith, Therefore Stand (Boston: W. A. Wilde Company, 1945), p. 197.

Wilbur M. Smith, in the summation of a remarkable chapter on the subject of peace and joy in believing, said,

In skepticism and unbelief, there has always been, there cannot help but be, despair in the place of hope, a miserable unceasing restlessness in the place of peace, and either an ever-deepening sorrow or a chilling stoicism instead of true and abiding joy. For all who have come to know and love the Lord Jesus Christ, no matter what their previous life was, no matter what their circumstances in life, there is available a peace that passeth all understanding and a joy the world can never take away. There is peace and joy in believing; there is neither in unbelief. Wilbur M. Smith, op. cit., p. 477.

By faith … The emphasis in this commentary on "the obedience of faith" is not intended to diminish in any manner or degree the true necessity of wholehearted, unreserved faith in God and in the Lord Jesus Christ. Faith is still the strong man that carries the little child Reason upon his shoulders. Faith is part of the foundation of Christianity; and without faith, it is impossible to please God (Hebrews 11:6). Whenever and wherever in human hearts there is enough faith to lead one to walk in all the light he has and strive for more, there, it may be presumed, is enough faith to save. The reason for insisting throughout this work that "faith only" is a sinful addition to the word of God, and in fact a denial of it, stems from two reasons, the first being that God’s word nowhere says that justification is by faith only, and the second being that it is impossible to define faith as automatically including obedience. When pressed, the advocates of the "faith only" position will often fall back upon the presumption that if one truly believes, he will also obey. Opposed to that presumption is this statement from the New Testament.

Even of the rulers many believed on him; but because of the Pharisees, they did not confess it, lest they should be put out of the synagogue:

for they loved the glory that is of men more than the glory that is of God (John 12:42-43).

The Lutheran error of supposing salvation to be by faith only, sprang from overlooking the biblically stated truth that many people did "believe on" the Lord Jesus Christ but, through love of the world, refused to follow him. As to the thesis, then, that true faith automatically includes obedience, it is utterly disproved by the lives of millions in every age, including those cited in John 12:42-43. In this context, it is interesting to note that Christ said, "If ye love me, ye will keep my commandments" (John 14:15); but he did not say, "If ye have faith in me, ye will keep my commandments," the latter being categorically untrue. Precisely in this, then, is the outrage of teaching that salvation is "by faith alone." Far from leading people to obey the gospel, that false doctrine is actually made the ground and excuse of millions for not obeying it!

Bibliographical Information
Coffman, James Burton. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Coffman's Commentaries on the Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​bcc/​romans-5.html. Abilene Christian University Press, Abilene, Texas, USA. 1983-1999.

Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible

Therefore - οὖν oun Since we are thus justified, or as a consequence of being justified, we have peace.

Being justified by faith - See the notes at Romans 1:17; Romans 3:24; Romans 4:5.

We - That is, all who are justified. The apostle is evidently speaking of true Christians.

Have peace with God - see the note at John 14:27. True religion is often represented as peace with God; see Acts 10:36; Romans 8:6; Romans 10:15; Romans 14:17; Galatians 5:22; see also Isaiah 32:17.

“And the work of righteousness shall be peace,

And the effect of righteousness.

Quietness and assurance forever:”

This is called peace, because,

  1. The sinner is represented as the enemy of God, Romans 8:7; Ephesians 2:16; James 4:4; John 15:18, John 15:24; John 17:14; Romans 1:30.

(2)The state of a sinner’s mind is far from peace. He is often agitated, alarmed, trembling. He feels that he is alienated from God. For,

“The wicked are like the troubled sea.

For it never can be at rest;

Whose waters cast up mire and dirt.”

Isaiah 57:20.

The sinner in this state regards God as his enemy. He trembles when he thinks of his Law; fears his judgments; is alarmed when he thinks of hell. His bosom is a stranger to peace. This has been felt in all lands, alike under the thunders of the Law of Sinai among the Jews; in the pagan world; and in lands where the gospel is preached. It is the effect of an alarmed and troubled conscience.

(3) The plan of salvation by Christ reveals God as willing to be reconciled. He is ready to pardon, and to be at peace. If the sinner repents and believes, God can now consistently forgive him, and admit him to favor. It is therefore a plan by which the mind of God and of the sinner can become reconciled, or united in feeling and in purpose. The obstacles on the part of God to reconciliation, arising from his justice and Law, have been removed, and he is now willing to be at peace. The obstacles on the part of man, arising from his sin, his rebellion, and his conscious guilt, may be taken away, and he can now regard God as his friend.

(4) The effect of this plan, when the sinner embraces it, is to produce peace in his own mind. He experiences peace; a peace which the world gives not, and which the world cannot take away, Philippians 4:7; 1 Peter 1:8; John 16:22. Usually in the work of conversion to God, this peace is the first evidence that is felt of the change of heart. Before, the sinner was agitated and troubled. But often suddenly, a peace and calmness is felt, which is before unknown. The alarm subsides; the heart is calm; the fears die away, like the waves of the ocean after a storm. A sweet tranquillity visits the heart - a pure shining light, like the sunbeams that break through the opening clouds after a tempest. The views, the feelings, the desires are changed; and the bosom that was just before filled with agitation and alarm, that regarded God as its enemy, is now at peace with him, and with all the world.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ - By means of the atonement of the Lord Jesus. It is his mediation that has procured it.

Bibliographical Information
Barnes, Albert. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Barnes' Notes on the Whole Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​bnb/​romans-5.html. 1870.

Living By Faith: Commentary on Romans & 1st Corinthians

5:1: Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ;

This chapter opens with a conclusion (“therefore”). This conclusion is based upon the first four chapters, especially the end of chapter 4. Paul’s conclusion may be broken down into three main points: (1) All are in need of “justification” (this is because all have sinned); (2) Justification is by faith instead of meritorious works and/or flawless law keeping; (3) Justification must come through Jesus Christ (4:25). Justification (dikaioo) is a verb which has a legal sense to it, and it occurs most frequently in this book (for all its occurrences in this book see 2:13; 3:4, 20, 24, 26, 28, 30; 4:2, 5; 5:1, 9; 6:7; 8:30, 33). Justification means the saved are freed from the penalty of sin and are the recipients of grace and other spiritual blessings.

Being justified by a system of faith (and this justification is our initial conversion as well as our on-going Christian life) is described in many ways. Illustrations of this are found in the following chart, and this information proves that Bible writers often selected (often for the sake of emphasis) just one element in the salvation process (grace, faith, baptism, confession, etc.).

We are saved by:Text:
“God”Mark 10:26-27
“Christ”John 3:17
The “name of Jesus”Acts 4:12
“Jesus’ words”John 5:34
“Jesus’ life”Romans 5:10
“Faith and baptism”Mark 16:16
“Receiving the word and being baptized”Acts 2:40-41
“Striving to enter the narrow door”Matthew 7:14
“Calling on the name of the Lord”Romans 10:13
“The words of Peter”Acts 11:13-14
“The words of Paul”1 Thessalonians 2:16
“Grace”Acts 15:11
“Jesus blood”Romans 5:9
“Receiving, standing in and holding fast the gospel”1 Corinthians 15:1-2
“Loving the truth”2 Thessalonians 2:10
“Listening to and believing the truth”Ephesians 1:13
“Losing our lives”Matthew 16:25
“Obedience”Hebrews 5:8-9
Through “Jesus’ intercession”Hebrews 7:25
“Humbly receiving the Word of God”James 1:21
An “active faith”James 2:21-24
“Turn from our sinful ways”James 5:19-20
We “snatch people from the fire”Judges 1:23
“Godly sorrow that leads to repentance”2 Corinthians 7:10
“Working out our own salvation”Philippians 2:12
“Take heed to self and teaching”1 Timothy 4:16
We use “God’s ‘milk’ to grow to salvation”1 Peter 2:2
We are forgiven by:New Testament text:
“Seeing, hearing, understanding and turning”Mark 4:12
“Loving much”Luke 7:47-48
The “blood of the new covenant”Matthew 26:28
“Repentance and baptism”Acts 2:38
“Repentance & prayer” (for Christians)Acts 8:22
“Belief in Christ”Acts 10:43
“Grace and blood”Ephesians 1:7
Entering into Christ and His “kingdom”Colossians 1:13-14
“Forgiving others”Matthew 6:14
We are justified by:New Testament text:
“Grace”Romans 3:24
Galatians 3:28“Jesus’ blood”Romans 5:9
“Works and not faith alone”James 2:24
“Our words”Matthew 12:37
“Belief”Acts 13:39
“Death to our old life”Romans 6:6-7

In addition to justification, Christians enjoy “peace.” This blessing, which is described in the present tense (“have”), comes “through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Since Christians are at peace with God, there is no fear of receiving wrath from God (2:5). If Christ had not paid the price for sin, God would be storing up wrath for us. Without justification, God would require us to give our souls as payment for sin. Now, instead of paying with our souls, a way out has been provided (2:4). This escape from sin also allows us to have fellowship with deity.

In spite of what Paul wrote, many do not have peace. Many have been convinced that they will miss heaven or that their salvation is uncertain. Scores of Christians wonder from day to day if they will spend eternity in heaven or hell. Sometimes they feel lost and sometimes they feel saved. This kind of outlook is both odd and wrong. Imagine a Christian who tells others about Jesus-the Son of Man who is also the Prince of Peace. These believers tell about the Prince of Peace, but they have little to no peace themselves. Is this sensible?

McGuiggan (p. 160) wrote: “To offer Jesus as the one who rode upon a donkey speaking peace to the world (Zechariah 9:9 ff) and then to grind out our lives in doubt, frustration and anxiety is worse than stupid. It is a bald-headed man trying to sell hair-restorer. It is a 450 pound, five feet six inch man speaking to people about dieting. It’s a man wasting-away before our very eyes from some horrible disease while he professes he has the sure cure.”

Bibliographical Information
Price, Brad "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Living By Faith: Commentary on Romans & 1st Corinthians". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​bpc/​romans-5.html.

Calvin's Commentary on the Bible

1.Being then justified, etc. The Apostle begins to illustrate by the effects, what he has hitherto said of the righteousness of faith: and hence the whole of this chapter is taken up with amplifications, which are no less calculated to explain than to confirm. He had said before, that faith is abolished, if righteousness is sought by works; and in this case perpetual inquietude would disturb miserable souls, as they can find nothing substantial in themselves: but he teaches us now, that they are rendered quiet and tranquil, when we have obtained righteousness by faith, we have peace with God; and this is the peculiar fruit of the righteousness of faith. When any one strives to seek tranquillity of conscience by works, (which is the case with profane and ignorant men,) he labors for it in vain; for either his heart is asleep through his disregard or forgetfulness of God’s judgment, or else it is full of trembling and dread, until it reposes on Christ, who is alone our peace.

Then peace means tranquillity of conscience, which arises from this, — that it feels itself to be reconciled to God. This the Pharisee has not, who swells with false confidence in his own works; nor the stupid sinner, who is not disquieted, because he is inebriated with the sweetness of vices: for though neither of these seems to have a manifest disquietude, as he is who is smitten with a consciousness of sin; yet as they do not really approach the tribunal of God, they have no reconciliation with him; for insensibility of conscience is, as it were, a sort of retreating from God. Peace with God is opposed to the dead security of the flesh, and for this reason, — because the first thing is, that every one should become awakened as to the account he must render of his life; and no one can stand boldly before God, but he who relies on a gratuitous reconciliation; for as long as he is God, all must otherwise tremble and be confounded. And this is the strongest of proofs, that our opponents do nothing but prate to no purpose, when they ascribe righteousness to works; for this conclusion of Paul is derived from this fact, — that miserable souls always tremble, except they repose on the grace of Christ.

Bibliographical Information
Calvin, John. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Calvin's Commentary on the Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​cal/​romans-5.html. 1840-57.

Smith's Bible Commentary

Shall we turn now in our Bibles to the fifth chapter of Romans.

Since chapter 3 Paul has been talking about justification by faith. How that God has declared me innocent because of my faith in Jesus Christ. Believing that He took my sin and died in my place; He became my substitute. He took God's judgment for my sin. He bore it for me. By my believing in Him, God declares me innocent of all charges, justified by faith.

In chapter 4 he illustrates from the Old Testament, from Abraham, the truth of justification by faith. Then gave to us the keys to Abraham's faith. So having set forth the treatise on justification by faith, in chapter 5 he begins,

Therefore being justified by faith ( Romans 5:1 ),

Having been justified by faith he begins to speak of the results in our own personal life and experience; that which I have experienced because of justification by faith.

The first benefit or blessing of justification by faith is that,

we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ ( Romans 5:1 ).

Something that would not be possible if I were justified by works that is possible for any length of period. As Christians there is, it seems, an inconsistency at times between my profession and my walk. I do not always do those things that are pleasing unto the Father. I cannot with Jesus say, "I do always those things that please the Father." I wish I could. I can't. Sometimes my works are outstanding. Sometimes I do extremely well. Other times I fail.

Now, if I were justified by works, then I would have peace with God as long as I was doing good. But when I failed, that peace would again be broken. But because I am justified by faith, I do believe in Jesus Christ; that doesn't change. I believe that He is the Son of, that He came to redeem the world, that He died for my sins, that He arose again the third day, and He is at the right hand of the Father making intercession for me, and I believe that He is coming again to establish God's kingdom on the earth.

Sometimes I don't do what is right, but my belief never changes. Even when I am doing something wrong, I still have a solid faith in Jesus Christ. Therefore, because my peace with God is predicated upon justification by faith I have always peace with God. As we studied last week, Paul's quotation of Psalm 32 , "Oh how happy is the man to whom God does not impute iniquity." Because I am justified by faith, my faith in Jesus Christ is unswerving, God does not impute or account iniquity to me. I have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

Secondly,

I have access by faith into this grace ( Romans 5:2 )

This glorious grace that God has manifested unto me, I have access into that grace through faith. Then I

rejoice in the hope of the glory of God ( Romans 5:2 ).

How wonderful it is that God has given to us this living hope through Jesus Christ. That is something that today the world's philosophy cannot offer to man. The existential philosophy has concluded that there is no universal good, that there is no universal truth. That truth must be experienced individually and it is how you see a thing and how you feel about a thing that constitutes truth to you. But it is a personal individual matter.

We can see examples of existentialism in art, the modern art, as you look at the paintings where it looks like some fellow has stood across the room and taken little plastic bags full of paint and thrown them against the canvas, and they exploded when they hit the canvas and popped out in all directions, and then they give some kind of a title to the thing, "Sunset at Maui." I have looked at some of those modern art paintings, and for the life of me I can't see anything in them. Someone stands there and says, "Oh, isn't that beautiful? Oh isn't that lovely?"

It is one of those things that you have got to see it yourself and interpret yourself. Now, when I was a kid we used to have Spanish stucco on the ceiling, and we used to see horses and things in the ceiling, but it takes a bit of imagination. You see the effect of it, you have to experience it, you interpret it for yourself, that is the whole ideal and the purpose of the art is to express the philosophy.

Coming home from Hawaii, my wife and I watched some dumb movie and it was one of those movies that they didn't put the end on it. You know the guy just goes walking off. Now, I don't know if he committed suicide or he sobered up and got right. You don't know what happened. They didn't finish the story; suddenly you see the end. Man, that's not the end, they didn't finish it. I was so mad that I wasted the time watching the unfinished story, but that again is a classic example of existential philosophy. And its purpose is to let you experience it and you put the end on the story. The story has a thousand different ends. Because each of us sees in it what we want to see. We, each of us, interpret it for ourselves.

Some of the modern music today is existentialism. I can't for the life of me find the melody. All I get is the beat, and you have to put in what you want. They provide the beat and you put in the melody. These are all examples of existential philosophy. Now, the result then of existential philosophy is a separation of people. It creates loneliness and isolation. It puts me in my own little island and you in your own little island, and I don't know if I am thinking what you are thinking, and you don't know if you are thinking as I am thinking, because we are alienated by the philosophy. I don't know if you are seeing in that picture what I am seeing. Now you know there are forms of art when you see the barn, and therefore and the cow on the fields and I have no problem with that. I can say that is a barn and that is a fence and that is a cow. I have no problem with that, and I know that when you look at it you can see a barn, and a fence, and a cow, because they are obvious. I am unified with you. As we stand there and look at it, I feel unified with you because I know you are seeing the same thing I'm seeing.

So the effect of existential is that of separation of man and making man isolated on an island. As each of us interpret life and truth as we experience it ourselves, but declaring that there is no universal truth or there is no universal good, that it is a matter of a person's individual experience, they have despaired of ever discovering truth or good.

Existential philosophy has concluded that reality can only bring despair and a person cannot live in despair, thus you must escape reality. And we see a world full of people trying to escape reality. They are trying to escape in so many different things, into nomadism, into drugs, into alcoholism, into impulsive eating, impulsive gambling, or so many ways by which a person is seeking to escape the world in which he lives. Existential philosophy suggests that a person take a leap of faith into a non-reason religious experience. Because you cannot live in reality because that is hopeless. You either escape reality, or you have some kind of a religious experience. That again is very unique and isolated. You can't explain it, but there is a sense, a consciousness of well-being. They talk about the ultimate experience.

We do have a hope. We can be real people. We can live in reality. As a Christian I can live in reality and I realize that the world is corrupt. I realize that government has failed. I realize that we have not and will not discover the solutions for world peace. And I agree with the existential philosophers that if you think we are going to discover world peace, you are not a realist. You are not living in reality. You are living in a fool's paradise. Reality would bring me to despair if I didn't have the hope of Jesus Christ. Because I have a hope in Jesus Christ, I can face the reality of life, but still rejoice in the hope because I know that when He comes we are going to live in a world of peace. We are going to live in a world where we don't have to worry about our grandchildren going to the market to buy a loaf of bread, being exposed to pornography or being exposed to the possibility of being accosted by some pervert.

That world is coming, it isn't now. And as long as Satan reigns it never will be. Satan isn't going to reign forever, thank God. Jesus is coming and is going to establish God's kingdom, and we shall sing the kingdoms of this world have become the kingdom of our Lord and of His Christ and He shall reign forever, forever, hallelujah, hallelujah. It will be cause for great praise. I rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. I have tonight a living hope for the future. Not in man, but in Jesus Christ and in God's kingdom. Not only so, this isn't all, he says,

We also glory in tribulation ( Romans 5:3 ):

What kind of a nut are you, Paul, to glory in tribulations?

Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount said, "Rejoice when men speak evil of you, for my name's sake. When men persecute you for righteousness sake. Blessed are you when men shall persecute you for righteousness sake, rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven.

The Bible tells us to count it all joy when you fall into diverse problems. I haven't achieved that yet, but I am working on it.

We glory in tribulation. How is it that I can glory in tribulation? I glory in tribulation because I have learned that in every trial there is an opportunity for God to manifest Himself in my life, and to work in my life. I have learned when there is pressure, when there are problems to just wait on the Lord. It took me a long time to learn that.

Right now we are waiting upon the Lord in regards to the bid we made upon the site in Newport Beach. The school board tells us that in two weeks that they will make their decision. I can honestly say that I am not tense. I am not nervous. I am not really concerned. If we get it, we get it; if we don't, we don't. When we bought the Greenville School from the Santa Ana School District, we put in a bid and we didn't even go to the board meeting where they were going to have the oral bids once they had opened the sealed bids that had come in. We just submitted a bid on a school and let it go at that. One morning the school secretary called me and said, "You just bought a school." I said, "Well, praise the Lord." In these times we have an opportunity to wait on God and see Him work, thus,

tribulation worketh patience ( Romans 5:3 ),

As I learned to wait upon God,

patience brings experience ( Romans 5:4 ),

Because as I wait upon God, I experience the work of God. I see God work. I learn by experience that God does work in every situation where we just wait on Him. I experience that work of God, and as I experience God's faithfulness in working out my problems, it only then enhances that hope. So I glory in tribulation because I know there is another opportunity for God to work in my life, for me to experience afresh God's love and God's grace as He works in my situation. As I see the work of God completed, my hope just gets stronger. Yes, God is faithful. Yes, God will keep His word. Yes, the Lord will establish His kingdom that He promised.

the experience, hope: and the hope makes not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us ( Romans 5:4-5 ).

So I have this glorious hope as God just pours out His love over my life through the Holy Spirit.

For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died ( Romans 5:6 )

For the good, sweet, wonderful, generous, kind people? No. Fortunately He died

for the ungodly ( Romans 5:6 ).

Oh, may the Holy Spirit take and stamp this truth deep in our hearts tonight. Christ died for the ungodly. I qualify.

For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commends his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us ( Romans 5:7-8 ).

When did God start loving you? When you surrendered your life to Jesus Christ? When you raised your hand and you went forward? When you said the sinner's prayer? Did God say, "Oh, isn't that sweet? I am going to love them now." No, God commended or displayed His love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for the ungodly. Because He died for us in that ungodly state, I have no place in myself whereof to boast. Well, the Lord died for me because He saw that I was doing my best. He knew I was trying hard; He knew I had potential? No! The grace of God is complete. Christ died for me when I was still a sinner, when I was in an ungodly state God loved me then. Now does God love you any less now that you are His child?

Isn't it interesting how so often we in our minds imagine God as being disgusted with us, or disappointed with us, or discouraged with us, or through with us. We can just imagine God having negative attitudes towards us.

I have shared before how when Jan was just a little girl and she was going through that nobody-loves-me routine. After she had been reprimanded for something and at that point none of her friends loved her, and her mother and daddy didn't love her, nobody loved her. We said, "Oh, yes, we love you." "No, you don't." She wasn't giving in so I finally said, "Well, Jesus loves you." "Oh, no, He doesn't." I said, "What?" "He just stuck His head out from one of the closets and stuck His tongue out at me." You know, sometimes we imagine Jesus doing that to us, like He has had it with us. And I can understand Him doing it, but He doesn't.

If while I was yet a sinner He died for me. God demonstrated, commended, displayed His love toward me in that while I was still a sinner Christ died for me. Now that I am a child of God, now that I am trying to live a life that is pleasing to Him, now that I seek to walk in fellowship and in that love, surely He doesn't love me any less. God commended His love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him ( Romans 5:9 ).

That is, that wrath of God that shall be revealed against the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men that Paul spoke about in chapter 1. He shall be saved from wrath.

It is interesting that the Great Tribulation is called "the day of God's wrath." In the opening of the sixth seal, as the people on earth cry for the rocks and the mountains to fall on them, they pray, "Hide us from the face of the Lamb, for the day of His wrath has come," but thank God if Jesus loved me when I was a sinner and died for me, how much more being justified now by His blood will I be saved from the wrath through Him.

For if, when we were enemies, [an enemy to God, if in that state] we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son; much more, being reconciled, we will be saved by his life ( Romans 5:10 ).

If His death could reconcile me to God, how much more His life as He lives to make intercession for me.

Notice there are several "much more" in this chapter, and I love the "much more." It is an argument from the lesser to the greater. It is a typical philosophical type of argument. Paul uses it often in his writings. And here, if through the death of Jesus I was reconciled to God, how much more shall I be saved by His life.

Not only so ( Romans 5:11 ),

Now this comes back to verse Romans 5:1 , "Therefore being justified by faith," and this is the final experience that Paul illustrates or gives to us the final result.

not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement ( Romans 5:11 ).

These are the results of being justified: I have peace with God, I have access to the grace, I rejoice in hope, and I joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ. This word atonement in the Greek is a different word from the Hebrew word translated atonement in the Old Testament. The word atonement in the Old Testament you find used quite a bit in Leviticus as you deal with the various sacrificial offering. "Thus shall they make an atonement for the sins." That Hebrew word is kaphar. If you will think of it as a covering, kaphar, a covering, that is a literal translation of the Hebrew kaphar. You shall make a covering for the sins. But the sacrifices of the animals in the Old Testament could not make an atonement for the sinner. It could only make a covering for the sin. It could not put away the sin, all it did was cover the sin. For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could put away sin. It took the blood of Jesus Christ to put away the sins. The Old Testament sacrifices were only looking forward to that sacrifice that God one day would make in sending His only begotten Son who would die as a lamb without spot or blemish.

"We are redeemed," Peter said, "From our vain empty living, not with the blood of bulls or goats but with the blood of Jesus Christ who was slain as a lamb without spot or blemish" ( 1 Peter 1:18-19 ). So the Greek word atonement is a different word with a different idea entirely than the Hebrew kaphar, or covering for sin. The Greek word atonement can best be understood if you break it up. At-one-ment. In that I have been made one with God through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ for me. So I joy in God because I have become one with God through Jesus Christ who has made this possible. He has made it possible that as He said, "In that day you shall know that I am in the Father, and ye are in me, and I am in you." This alienation that once existed between God and man no longer exists.

Isaiah said, "God's hand is not short that he can not save, neither is his ear heavy that he can not hear, but your sins have separated you from God." But now that the sins are put away, Jesus has made this at-one-ment, He has bought me into one with the Father. This is the record that God has given us eternal life this life is in the Son, and He that has the Son has life, that life of God, one with God.

"These things," John said, "Write we unto you, that you might have fellowship with us and truly our fellowship is with the Father and His Son Jesus Christ" ( 1 John 1:3 ). The word fellowship, koinonia is the same idea: oneness, a communion, a joining together with. So I have been joined together with God through Jesus Christ.

Now Paul teaches a very important doctrinal truth and, unfortunately, there are those today who are teaching something other than this basic doctrinal truth that Paul is getting across here in the later portion of chapter 5 of Romans.

There is a teaching today that has been called the moral government of God. This teaching the moral government of God, among other things, teaches that man is not sinful by nature, but sinful by choice. When Adam sinned he sinned for himself, but Adam's sin was not passed on to me, that I was born as Adam, totally innocent, and totally neutral. That I am a sinner because then I chose to sin. But Adam has no responsibility with my sinful state. I only am responsible for my own sinful state.

This is a very dangerous doctrine, because as you read the whole treatise that Paul has here, the whole idea is that if one man could make us all sinners then one man could make us all righteous. But if you deny that one man made us all sinners, then you must also deny that one man made us all righteous, and thus, I am a sinner by choice or I am righteous by my works, and it leads to a works/righteous position, which is one that none of you can maintain. I can't; I tried to maintain that position for years. I never could. All that did was bring me into condemnation and guilt and frustration.

Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned ( Romans 5:12 ):

Now let me point out that the word have is not in the Greek text. What the Greek text reads is, "Wherefore, by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned." We all sinned in Adam. He acted as a federal head, he acted for all of us, and by his sin death entered the world. By his sin we were all made sinners.

God said to Adam, "The day that thou eatest, thou shalt surely die." He was talking about spiritual death, which Adam experienced when he ate of the forbidden fruit, his spirit died. Adam could not pass on through his genes something that he did not possess, spiritual life. Through the genes all he could pass on was a physical body with a capacity of a consciousness, but being dead spiritually he could not by procreation pass on spiritual life. One man sinned, death entered the world, and death passed unto all men.

Paul the apostle in Ephesians 2 , in describing our past lives, said, "You hath He made alive (spiritually), who were dead because of your trespasses and sins. Who in times past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, that even now is working in the children of disobedience, among whom you all once had your manner of living. You were by nature the children of wrath even as others" ( Ephesians 2:1-3 ). That is by nature, because by one man's sin death entered the world and death passed unto all men, for all sin.

Therefore, I sin because I am a sinner; sinning does not make me a sinner, it only proves that I am a sinner. You say, "Well, what about the little children who died?" God takes care of them. They're safe. "Oh that precious little innocent baby." Are you sure? Look at the way they are making their fleshly demands, listen to them wail, look at them kick and flail around. If they were bit enough and strong enough they would rip that crib apart.

How many of you had to be taught how to tell a lie? Why is it necessary to teach your children to be honest? They seem to learn to lie very naturally. So we have to teach the positive values. For a child left to himself will bring the reproach to his parents according to the scriptures. For we by nature are the children of wrath.

(For until the law the sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed where there is no law ( Romans 5:13 ).

Sin was there, but it wasn't imputed because there was no law. Adam had one law; he broke it. Oh, he had a few positives and one negative, but he broke it. If there is no law that says that the speed limit is fifty-five miles per hour then you can't be ticketed for going over fifty-five. But it is because there is a law that says that is the limit, you can be ticketed for going over that limit. But it used to be in some areas that they did not have speed laws, and thus you could not be ticketed for speeding because there was no speed law. Most generally then they would ticket you for reckless driving if you were driving beyond a speed limit that was safe. But where there is no law you cannot be arrested for violating the law, because there is no law that pertains to that. Until the law was given, their sin was in the world but it wasn't imputed or accounted to man.

Nevertheless even from Adam to Moses death reigned ( Romans 5:14 ),

The consequences of sin was still there and men died.

even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who was a figure of him who was to come [even Jesus.] But not as the offense, so also is the free gift: for if through the offense of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many ( Romans 5:14-15 ).

This is the important teaching of one man's righteousness making many righteous. How is it that God can account me righteous? Because Jesus is righteous. His righteousness imputed to me by my faith in Him.

Not as it was by one that sinned, so is the gift: for the judgment was by one unto condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses unto justification. For if by one man's offense death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.) ( Romans 5:16-17 )

So by one man sin entered the world, death by sin, death passed unto all men for all sinned. Even so, by one man's righteousness of many made righteous who believe in Him and who are justified by faith and many come into eternal life through the one. One man brought death, the first Adam brought death, and Jesus Christ brought life. Adam brought sin. Jesus brought righteousness, and thus, Jesus acts as a federal head as Adam acted as a federal head for humanity. Now Jesus acts as the federal head for all those who believe in Him, and you are made a new creation.

The old things are passed away and everything becomes new. You can't say, "Well, that is just my Irish temper," because I have a new nature, the nature of Jesus Christ. I have been born again by the Spirit of God, a new creature, a new nature, and I relate now to Jesus Christ as the origin of my life.

Therefore, as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Moreover the law entered, that the offense might abound. Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound ( Romans 5:18-20 ):

The law came along in order that we might see how far we did miss the mark. The word sin means missing the mark. But if you don't see the mark, how can you miss it? How can you know how far you have missed it? You may be shooting wildly, but I can't convince you of that until I put up the mark. Then as your arrows go flying all over everywhere, I say, "Oh man, you really missed the mark." The law came along that we might see how far we missed the divine ideal. How far we came from living a life that was acceptable and pleasing to God. The law once and forever put down the thought of self-righteousness if properly understood. The law entered that the offense might abound, but where sin abounded, grace did overflow.

That as sin has reigned unto death, even so grace might reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord ( Romans 5:21 ).

As you go back and meditate on chapter 5, underline the "much mores", and meditate upon the contrast that he draws. Another thing to mark in chapter 5 is the many references to Jesus Christ our Lord, or through Jesus Christ our Lord, or by Jesus, that which we have through Him, that which we have by Him, and these are the things that you want to note in chapter 5.

"



Bibliographical Information
Smith, Charles Ward. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Smith's Bible Commentary". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​csc/​romans-5.html. 2014.

Contending for the Faith

Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ;

Therefore, being justified by faith: The word "Therefore" serves a dual function. It introduces a summary of the preceding argument (1:18-4:25) and also ushers in a smooth transitional clause connecting what follows with what precedes. Such a construction is not unusual with Paul. Romans 3:23 sums up the previous section (1:18-3:20), and connects it with the subsequent one. The same type of wording occurs again in Romans 8:1, which sums up the argument of chapter seven and opens up the one in chapter eight.

When Paul summarizes the instruction concerning justification (1:16-4:25), he does not teach the popular denominational doctrine of justification by faith alone. Nothing could be further removed from Paul’s mind. In the first place, he sounds his mission clearly at the outset (1:5) with these words: "we have received grace and apostleship to call people from among all the Gentiles to the obedience that comes from faith" (NIV). In the second place, he closes the book with a similar declaration, explaining why the gospel was given—"so that all nations might believe and obey him" (16:25-26 NIV)—lest anyone forget or misconstrue what he has written. In the third place, the idea that Paul ever taught a doctrine of mental assent (belief) only without the action required by that acknowledgment (obedience) is absurd (2:7-11; 6:16-18; 10:13-21; 15:18; 1 Corinthians 11:2; 2 Corinthians 2:9; 2 Corinthians 10:5-6; Galatians 5:6; Ephesians 2:8-10; Ephesians 5:24; Ephesians 6:5-10; Philippians 2:5-16; Philippians 3:16; Colossians 2:6; 1 Thessalonians 4:1-3; 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9; 1 Timothy 6:3; 1 Timothy 6:11-14; 2 Timothy 3:16-17; Titus 3:8; Philemon 1:21). Many more passages could be elicited from Paul’s letters, revealing the absolute necessity of an obedient faith. Finally, the immediate context demands that the faith by which men are justified be interpreted as an obedient faith. The first clause of chapter five must not be isolated from chapter four. The thrust of chapter four is that the faith that justifies is the kind of faith Abraham had. It is easily demonstrated both from Paul’s own writing (4:12, 17-21) and from the book of Genesis (12:1-25:10) that Abraham’s faith was marked by these essential qualities:

1.    A continuous daily trust in God, which is evidenced in total commitment to God’s will;

2.    A determination to obey the known will of God, which is evidenced in practice;

3.    A humble, repentant heart ever willing to correct its thoughts and/or actions when they are discovered to be inconsistent with God’s will.

When Paul argues that we are made righteous by faith in Christ instead of by works of the law, it is equivalent to saying that men become righteous by obedience to the gospel rather than by obedience to the law. As Whiteside notes:

With Paul, faith in Christ means full acceptance of Christ as he is revealed to us and the faithful ordering of our lives according to his will. They greatly err who seek to prove by Paul that we are justified by faith only, without obedience to the gospel (114).

we have peace with God: Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God. Before leaving the concept of justification, Paul speaks of justification as a completed past act. Justification is not like sanctification, which is an abiding and increasing work throughout the Christian life. When one believes in Jesus Christ as God’s son to the degree that he places his full trust in Him; repents of his sins; confesses with his mouth the faith that is in his heart, saying, "I believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God"; and is baptized for the remission of his sins; he is justified or declared righteous by God. It is a completed action.

Consequent to his justification, the believer has peace with God. Since he has been forgiven of his sins and declared to be righteous on the basis of his faith, the wrath of God has been taken away, leaving peace to reign. One of the marks of the believer’s new life is "peace with God."

Paul is stressing the fact that "we have been justified" means we have also been reconciled and have peace with God.

The peace we have with God is not only an inner condition of the soul. It is not simply a subjective state of mind. Nor is it simply a feeling or emotion. Ordinarily, when we think of peace, we mean the opposite of disturbance or unrest. We mean a calm, exalted, and peaceful mood of the soul. And, clearly, Paul includes these ideas in his meaning here; however, there is more to it than that. Paul describes a concept that implies a relationship—the mutual relationship between God and man. Nygren comments:

If one stands in the right relation with God, it follows also that his inner condition is one of calm and rest; but this is a consequence and not the basic fact. That which is fundamental is the relation of peace with God; and it is primarily of this that Paul speaks (192).

Before Christ came to earth, before He paid the penalty for sin by the sacrifice of Himself upon the cross, the relationship between God and men was marked by opposition, separation, and even enmity (verse 10). On both sides the relation was disturbed. Man was in rebellion to God’s will. By seeking his own will, man was at enmity with God. God, on the other hand, though He was never man’s enemy, was justly wrathful against hostile humanity. But through the reconciling work of Jesus, the relationship between God and believers has been righted. As Nygren notes:

He who through faith is righteous no longer stands under the wrath of God; nor is he any longer, on his part, hostile to God. Both of these aspects are included in the fact that he has peace with God (193).

The accent falls on the objective side: Christ has removed the wrath of God from those who have been justified by their faith. To live in Christ is to be free from the wrath of God. Paul knows the wrath of God is an unspeakably terrible reality (2 Corinthians 5:11). That is why so much emphasis must be placed on the objective nature of the peace the justified believer possesses. If the only value of Christ’s redemptive sacrifice were a subjective theory of the atonement, resulting in the removal of man’s hostility to God, but with no real change on God’s part, then nothing of substance would have been gained. No change on the part of man can effect a real fellowship between him and God. The fact is God has become friends again with the faithful, and His righteous wrath is removed from them. They have peace with God.

Before leaving this phrase, the reader should consider a textual problem. The controversy revolves around whether the Greek word rendered "we have" in the King James Version should be rendered "let us have" as it is in many more recent versions. The problem is over one letter in the Greek. Should the text read e&xwmen with a long "o" (ω - omega) or e&xomen with a short "o" (o- omicron)? It appears this distinction amounts to a difference with virtually no substance. If the omega spelling is accepted, Paul is stating a fact: those justified by faith have peace with God. If the omicron spelling is adopted (apparently the evidence for this idea is weightier), then Paul is saying let us enjoy the peace with God that we have because of our justification by faith. Metzger comments in A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, a companion volume to the United Bible Societies’ Greek New Testament (Third Edition):

Although the subjunctive e&xwmen (spelled with the omega—AWB) …has far better external support than the indicative e&xomen …a majority of the Committee judged that the internal evidence must here take precedence. Since in this passage it appears that Paul is not exhorting but stating facts ("peace" is the possession, of those who have been justified), only the indicative is consonant with the apostle’s argument. Since the difference in pronunciation between omicron and omega in the Hellenistic age was almost non-existent, when Paul dictated e&xomen(the indicative with the omicron—AWB), Tertius, his amanuensis (16.22), may have written down e&xwmen (the subjunctive with omega) (452).

through our Lord Jesus Christ: In Romans 3:24, our justification is through Jesus; thus, we are reconciled to God through Jesus (verse 10; 2 Corinthians 5:18-19). This formula is repeated with slight variations in verses 11 and 21 of this chapter. Also, it appears at the end of chapters six, seven, and eight (6:23; 7:25; 8:39). These references seem scarcely accidental. They have the double effect of marking off these four sections of the epistle and, at the same time, underlining that they belong together as a single main division. This entire section describes the new life of the Christian, and Paul insists repeatedly that everything he is saying is true only "in Christ" and through Christ. Without Christ, one would always remain in bondage to the rulers of this world. But when Jesus becomes the believer’s Lord—his owner, ruler, master, and controller—He brings to an end the dominion of the powers of evil. No longer are we in their grip. Nygren explains:

When Christ is our ku/rio$ (Lord—AWB), there can be no other kurio/th$ (lord—AWB). All the old tyrants—Wrath, Sin, the Law, and Death—are cast down, and we become Christ’s and live under Him in His kingdom, serving Him in eternal righteousness. We are set free from the powers of destruction; we are free from wrath, the power of destruction which Paul has particularly in mind in this chapter (194).

Bibliographical Information
Editor Charles Baily, "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Contending for the Faith". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​ctf/​romans-5.html. 1993-2022.

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

"Therefore" signals that what follows rests on what has preceded. Paul now put the question of whether justification is by faith or by works behind him. He had proved that it comes to us by faith.

"We must note at once that the Greek form of this verb ’declared righteous,’ or ’justified,’ is not the present participle, ’being declared righteous,’ but rather the aorist participle, ’having been declared righteous,’ or ’justified.’ You say, What is the difference? The answer is, ’being declared righteous’ looks to a state you are in; ’having been declared righteous’ looks back to a fact that happened. ’Being in a justified state’ of course is incorrect, confusing, as it does, justification and sanctification." [Note: Ibid., p. 163.]

Some important Greek manuscripts read, "Let us have peace with God." If this is the correct reading, the meaning is, "Let us keep on having (and enjoying) peace with God." [Note: Robertson, 4:354; Witmer, p. 456. See also Verlyn D. Verbrugge, "The Grammatical Internal Evidence for ’EXOMEN in Romans 5:1," Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 54:3 (September 2011):559-72.]

The second of the blessings "that came spilling out of the cornucopia of justification," [Note: Harrison, p. 55.] after justification itself, is peace (cf. Romans 1:7; Romans 2:10). However this is peace with God (i.e., reconciliation), not just a subjective feeling of tranquillity that is the peace of God (Philippians 4:7). Paul had been speaking of God’s wrath being poured out on sinners (Romans 1:18). Those who stand justified need not fear God’s wrath since Jesus Christ has made peace between them and God by His death (cf. Colossians 1:20; Ephesians 2:14). Note that references to peace and reconciliation frame this pericope (Romans 5:1; Romans 5:11).

"Peace and joy are twin blessings of the gospel: as an old preacher put it, ’peace is joy resting; joy is peace dancing.’" [Note: Bruce, p. 114.]

 

"Our peace with God is not as between two nations before at war; but as between a king and rebellious and guilty subjects." [Note: Newell, p. 165.]

 

"It is well known that Romans lacks any extended christological discussion per se, but Paul’s repeated insistence in these chapters [5-8] that all the believer experiences of God’s blessings comes only through Christ develops a very significant christological focus in its own right. Christology, we might say, is not the topic of any part of Romans 5-8, but it is the basis for everything in these chapters." [Note: Moo, p. 300.]

Bibliographical Information
Constable, Thomas. DD. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Dr. Constable's Expository Notes". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​dcc/​romans-5.html. 2012.

Dr. Constable's Expository Notes

D. The benefits of justification 5:1-11

Paul’s original readers would have had another question because of what he had written in chapters 1-4. Is this method of justification safe? Since it is by faith, it seems quite unsure. Paul next gave evidence that this method is reliable by explaining the results of justification by faith.

Moo argued that chapter 5 belongs with chapters 6-8 more than with Romans 3:21 to Romans 4:25. [Note: Moo, pp. 290-95.] He noted a chiastic structure in chapters 5-8 and believed the theme of this section is assurance of glory. Most scholars, however, have felt that the major break in Paul’s thought occurs after chapter 5 rather than before it.

"In the first eleven verses we have the blessed results of justification by faith, along with the most comprehensive statement in the Bible of the pure love and grace of God, in giving Christ for us sinners." [Note: Newell, p. 162.]

Bibliographical Information
Constable, Thomas. DD. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Dr. Constable's Expository Notes". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​dcc/​romans-5.html. 2012.

Barclay's Daily Study Bible

Chapter 5

AT HOME WITH GOD ( Romans 5:1-5 )

5:1-5 Since, then, we have been put into a right relationship with God in consequence of faith, let us enjoy peace with him through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him, by faith, we are in possession of an introduction to this grace in which we stand; and let us glory in the hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but let us find a cause of glorying in our troubles; for we know that trouble produces fortitude, and fortitude produces character; and character produces hope; and hope does not prove an illusion, because the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given unto us.

Here is one of Paul's great lyrical passages in which he almost sings the intimate joy of his confidence in God. Trusting faith has done what the labour to produce the works of the law could never do; it has given a man peace with God. Before Jesus came, no man could ever be really close to God.

Some, indeed, have seen him, not as the supreme good, but as the supreme evil. Swinburne wrote:

"His hidden face and iron feet,

Hath not man known and felt them in their way

Threaten and trample all things every day?

Hath he not sent us hunger? Who hath cursed

Spirit and flesh with longing? Filled with thirst

Their lips that cried to him?"

Some have seen him as the complete stranger, the utterly untouchable. In one of H. G. Wells' books there is the story of a man of affairs whose mind was so tensed and strained that he was in serious danger of a complete nervous and mental breakdown. His doctor told him that the only thing that could save him was to find the peace that fellowship with God can give. "What!" he said, "to think of that, up there, having fellowship with me! I would as soon think of cooling my throat with the milky way or shaking hands with the stars!" God, to him, was the completely unfindable. Rosita Forbes, the traveller, tells of finding shelter one night in a Chinese village temple because there was nowhere else to sleep. In the night she woke and the moonlight was slanting in through the window on to the faces of the images of the gods, and on every face there was a snarl and a sneer, as of those who hated men.

It is only when we realize that God is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ that there comes into life that intimacy with him, that new relationship, which Paul calls justification.

Through Jesus, says Paul, we have an introduction to this grace in which we stand. The word he uses for introduction is prosagoge, ( G4318) . It is a word with two great pictures in it.

(i) It is the regular word for introducing or ushering someone into the presence of royalty; and it is the regular word for the approach of the worshipper to God. It is as if Paul was saying, "Jesus ushers us into the very presence of God. He opens the door for us to the presence of the King of Kings; and when that door is opened what we find is grace; not condemnation, not judgment, not vengeance, but the sheer, undeserved, incredible kindness of God."

(ii) But prosagoge ( G4318) has another picture in it. In late Greek it is the word for the place where ships come in, a harbour or a haven. If we take it that way, it means that so long as we tried to depend on our own efforts we were tempest-tossed, like mariners striving with a sea which threatened to overwhelm them completely, but now that we have heard the word of Christ, we have reached at last the haven of God's grace, and we know the calm of depending, not on what we can do for ourselves, but on what God has done for us.

Because of Jesus we have entry to the presence of the King of Kings and entry to the haven of God's grace.

No sooner has Paul said this than the other side of the matter strikes him. All this is true, and it is glory; but the fact remains that in this life the Christians are up against it. It is hard to be a Christian in Rome. Remembering that, Paul produces a great climax. "Trouble," he said, "produces fortitude." The word he uses for trouble is thlipis ( G2347) , which literally means pressure. All kinds of things may press in upon the Christian--want and straitened circumstances, sorrow, persecution, unpopularity and loneliness. All that pressure, says Paul, produces fortitude. The word he uses for fortitude is hupomone ( G5281) which means more than endurance. It means the spirit which can overcome the world; it means the spirit which does not passively endure but which actively overcomes the trials and tribulations of life.

When Beethoven was threatened with deafness, that most terrible of troubles for a musician, he said: "I will take life by the throat." That is hupomone ( G5281) . When Scott was involved in ruin because of the bankruptcy of his publishers, he said: "No man will say 'Poor fellow!' to me; my own right hand will pay the debt." That is hupomone ( G5281) . Someone once said to a gallant soul who was undergoing a great sorrow: "Sorrow fairly colours life, doesn't it?" Back came the reply: "Yes! And I propose to choose the colour!" That is hupomone ( G5281) . When Henley was lying in Edinburgh Infirmary with one leg amputated, and the prospect that the other must follow, he wrote Invictus.

"Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the Pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul."

That is hupomone ( G5281) . Hupomone is not the spirit which lies down and lets the floods go over it; it is the spirit which meets things breastforward and overcomes them.

"Fortitude," Paul goes on, "produces character." The word he uses for character is dokime ( G1382) . Dokime ( G1382) is used of metal which has been passed through the fire so that everything base has been purged out of it. It is used of coinage as we use the word sterling. When affliction is met with fortitude, out of the battle a man emerges stronger, and purer, and better, and nearer God.

"Character," Paul goes on, "produces hope." Two men can meet the same situation. It can drive one of them to despair, and it can spur the other to triumphant action. To the one it can be the end of hope, to the other it can be a challenge to greatness. "I do not like crises," said Lord Reith, "but I do like the opportunities they provide." The difference corresponds to the difference between the men. If a man has let himself become weak and flabby, if he has allowed circumstances to beat him, if he has allowed himself to whine and grovel under affliction, he has made himself such that when the challenge of the crisis comes he cannot do other than despair. If, on the other hand, a man has insisted on meeting life with head up, if he has always faced and, by facing, conquered things, then when the challenge comes, he meets it with eyes aflame with hope. The character which has endured the test always emerges in hope.

Then Paul makes one last great statement: "The Christian hope never proves an illusion for it is founded on the love of God." Omar Khayyam wrote wistfully of human hopes:

"The Worldly Hope men set their hearts upon

Turns Ashes--or it prospers; and anon,

Like Snow upon the Desert's dusty Face

Lighting a little Hour or two--is gone."

When a man's hope is in God, it cannot turn to dust and ashes. When a man's hope is in God, it cannot be disappointed. When a man's hope is in the love of God, it can never be an illusion, for God loves us with an everlasting love backed by an everlasting power.

THE FINAL PROOF OF LOVE ( Romans 5:6-11 )

5:6-11 While we were still helpless, in God's good time, Christ died for the ungodly. A man will hardly die for a just man. It may be that a man would even dare to die for the good cause. But God proves his love to us by the fact that while we were still sinners Christ died for us. Since we have been brought into a right relationship with God at the price of his life's blood, much more through him we shall be saved from the Wrath. For if while we were still at enmity with God, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, now that we have been reconciled, we shall go on being saved by his life. Not only that, but we glory in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have received this reconciliation.

The fact that Jesus Christ died for us is the final proof of God's love. It would be difficult enough to get a man to die for a just man; it might be possible for a man to be persuaded to die for some great and good principle; a man might have the greater love that would make him lay down his life for his friend. But the wonder of Jesus Christ is that he died for us when we are sinners and in a state of hostility to God. Love can go no further than that.

Rita Snowdon relates an incident from the life of T. E. Lawrence. In 1915 he was journeying across the desert with some Arabs. Things were desperate. Food was almost done, and water was at its last drop. Their hoods were over their heads to shelter them from the wind which was like a flame and full of the stinging sand of the sandstorm. Suddenly someone said, "Where is Jasmin?" Another said, "Who is Jasmin?" A third answered, "That yellow-faced man from Mean. He killed a Turkish tax-collector and fled to the desert." The first said, "Look, Jasmin's camel has no rider. His rifle is strapped to the saddle, but Jasmin is not there." A second said, "Someone has shot him on the march." A third said, "He is not strong in the head, perhaps he is lost in a mirage; he is not strong in the body, perhaps he has fainted and fallen off his camel." Then the first said, "What does it matter? Jasmin was not worth ten pence." And the Arabs hunched themselves up on their camels and rode on. But Lawrence turned and rode back the way he had come. Alone, in the blazing heat, at the risk of his life, he went back. After an hour and a half's ride he saw something against the sand. It was Jasmin, blind and mad with heat and thirst, being murdered by the desert. Lawrence lifted him up on his camel, gave him some of the last drops of precious water, slowly plodded back to his company. When he came up to them, the Arabs looked in amazement. "Here is Jasmin," they said, "Jasmin, not worth ten pence, saved at his own risk by Lawrence, our lord." That is a parable. It was not good men Christ died to save but sinners; not God's friends but men at enmity with him.

Then Paul goes on a step. Through Jesus our status with God was changed. Sinners though we were, we were put into a right relationship with God. But that is not enough. Not only our status must be changed but our state. The saved sinner cannot go on being a sinner; he must become good. Christ's death changed our status; his risen life changes our state. He is not dead but alive; he is with us always to help us and guide us, to fill us with his strength so as to overcome temptation, to clothe our lives with something of his radiance. Jesus begins by putting sinners into a right relationship with God even when they are still sinners; he goes on, by his grace, to enable them to quit their sin and become good men. There are technical names for these things. The change of our status is justification; that is where the whole saving process begins. The change of our state is sanctification; that is where the saving process goes on, and never ends, until we see him face to face and are like him.

There is one thing to note here of quite extraordinary importance. Paul is quite clear that the whole saving process, the coming of Christ and the death of Christ, is the proof of Gods love. Sometimes the thing is stated as if on the one side there was a gentle and loving Christ, and on the other an angry and vengeful God; and as if Christ had done something which changed God's attitude to men. Nothing could be further from the truth. The whole matter springs from the love of God. Jesus did not come to change God's attitude to men; he came to show what it is and always was. He came to prove unanswerably that God is love.

RUIN AND RESCUE ( Romans 5:12-21 )

5:12-21 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and, through sin, death entered into the world, and so death spread to all men, in that they had sinned; for up to the coming of the law sin was in the world, but sin was not debited against men because the law did not yet exist; but death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses even over those who had not sinned in the way that Adam had, Adam, who was the symbol of the one who was to come. But the gift of free grace was not like the trespass. For if the many died in consequence of the sin of the one, much more the grace of God and his free gift in the grace of the one man Jesus Christ abounded to many. The free gift is not like the effect of the one man who sinned. The sentence which followed the one sin was a sentence of condemnation; but the free gift which followed the many trespasses was a sentence of acquittal. For if, because of the trespass of one, death reigned because of one, much more they who receive the superabundance of grace and of that free gift which establishes a right relationship between man and God, shall reign in life through the one Jesus Christ. So, then, as by one sin it came to all men to fall under sentence, so by one supreme act of righteousness it came to men to enter into that relationship with God which gives them life. Just as through the disobedience of one man the many were constituted sinners, so, through the obedience of one man, the many were constituted righteous. But the law slipped in that trespass might abound; but where sin abounded grace superabounded, so that just as sin reigned in death, grace might reign by putting men into a right relationship with God that they might enter into eternal life because of what Jesus Christ our Lord has done.

No passage of the New Testament has had such an influence on theology as this; and no passage is more difficult for a modern mind to understand. It is difficult because Paul expresses himself in a difficult way. We can see, for instance, that the first sentence never ends, but breaks off in mid-air, while Paul pursues another idea down a sideline. Still more, it is thinking and speaking in terms which were familiar to Jews and perfectly understandable to them, but which are unfamiliar to us.

If we were to put the thought of this passage into one sentence, which, indeed, was the sentence which Paul set out to write at the very beginning, and which got sidetracked, it would be this: "By the sin of Adam all men became sinners and were alienated from God; by the righteousness of Jesus Christ all men became righteous and are restored to a right relationship with God." Paul, in fact, said this very much more clearly in 1 Corinthians 15:21: "As by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive."

There are two basic Jewish ideas in the light of which this passage must be read.

(i) There is the idea of solidarity. The Jew never really thought of himself as an individual but always thought as part of a clan, a family, or a nation apart from which he had no real existence. To this day it is said that if an Australian aboriginal is asked his name, he gives the name of his tribe or clan. He does not think of himself as a person, but as a member of a society. One of the clearest instances of this kind of thing in recognizable action is the blood feud amongst primitive people. Suppose a man from one tribe murders a man from another tribe. It becomes the duty of the first tribe to take vengeance on the second; it is the tribe that has been hurt, and the tribe which takes vengeance.

In the Old Testament there is one vivid instance of this. It is the case of Achan as related in Joshua 7:1-26. At the siege of Jericho, Achan kept to himself certain spoils in direct defiance of the commandment of God that all should be destroyed. The next item in the campaign was the siege of Ai, which should have fallen without trouble. The assaults against it, however, failed disastrously. Why? Because Achan had sinned, and, as a result, the whole nation was branded as sinner and punished by God. Achan's sin was not one man's sin but the nation's. The nation was not a collection of individuals; it was a solid mass. What the individual did, the nation did. When Achan's sin was admitted, it was not he alone who was executed but his whole family. Again, Achan was not a solitary, self-responsible individual; he was one of a solid mass of people from whom he could not be separated.

That is how Paul sees Adam. Adam was not an individual. He was one of mankind, and because he was one of mankind, his sin was the sin of all men.

Paul says that all men sinned in Adam. If we are ever to understand Paul's thought here, we must be quite sure what he means, and we must be equally sure that he was serious. All through the history of Christian thinking there have been efforts to interpret in different ways this conception of the connection between Adam's sin and that of mankind.

(a) The passage has been taken to mean that "each man is his own Adam." This really means that, just as Adam sinned, all men have sinned, but that there is no real connection between the sin of Adam and the sin of mankind, other than that it could be said that Adam's sin is typical of the sin of all mankind.

(b) There is what has been called the legal interpretation. This would hold that Adam was the representative of mankind and the human race shares in the deed of its representative. But a representative must be chosen by the people he represents; and in no sense can we say that of Adam.

(c) There is the interpretation that what we inherit from Adam is the tendency to sin. That is true enough, but that is not what Paul meant. It would not, in fact, suit his argument at all.

(d) The passage ought to be given what is called the realistic interpretation, namely that, because of the solidarity of the human race, all mankind actually sinned in Adam. This idea was not strange to a Jew; it was the actual belief of the Jewish thinkers. The writer of 2 Esdras is quite clear about it. "A grain of evil was sown in the heart of Adam from the beginning and how much wickedness has it brought forth unto this time; and how much shall it yet bring forth till the time of the threshing come" ( 2Esther 4:30). "For the first Adam, bearing a wicked heart, transgressed and was overcome; and not only he but all they also who are born of him" ( 2Esther 3:21).

(ii) The second basic idea is intimately connected with this in Paul's argument. Death is the direct consequence of sin. It was the Jewish belief that, if Adam had not sinned, man would have been immortal. Sirach (Sirach 2:23) writes, "A woman was the beginning of sin and through her all die." The Book of Wisdom has it, "God created man for immortality and made him the image of his own proper nature; but by the envy of the devil death entered into the world." In Jewish thought, sin and death are integrally connected. This is what Paul is getting at in the involved and difficult line of thought in Romans 5:12-14. We may trace his thought there in a series of ideas.

(a) Adam sinned because he broke a direct commandment of God not to eat of the fruit of the forbidden tree--and because he sinned, he died, although he was meant to be immortal.

(b) The law did not come until the time of Moses. Now, if there is no law, there can be no breach of the law; that is to say, there can be no sin. Therefore, the men who lived between Adam and Moses did in fact commit sinful actions, but they could not be counted sinners, for the law did not yet exist.

(c) In spite of the fact that sin could not be reckoned to them, they still died. Death reigned over them, although they could not be accused of breaking a non-existent law.

(d) Why, then, did they die? It was because they had sinned in Adam. Their involvement in his sin caused their deaths, although there was no law for them to break. That, in fact, is Paul's proof that all men did sin in Adam.

So, then, we have extracted the essence of one side of Paul's thought. Because of this idea of the complete solidarity of mankind, all men literally sinned in Adam; and because it is the consequence of sin, death reigned over all men.

But this very same conception, which can be used to produce so desperate a view of the human situation, can be used in reverse to fill it with a blaze of glory. Into this situation comes Jesus. To God Jesus offered perfect goodness. And, just as all men were involved in Adam's sin, all men are involved in Jesus' perfect goodness; and, just as Adam's sin was the cause of death, so Jesus' perfect goodness conquers death and gives men life eternal. Paul's triumphant argument is that, as mankind was solid with Adam and was therefore condemned to death, so mankind is solid with Christ and is therefore acquitted to life. Even although the law has come and made sin much more terrible, the grace of Christ overcomes the condemnation which the law must bring.

That is Paul's argument, and on Jewish grounds it is unassailable. But it has one great flaw, as it has one great truth.

(i) The flaw is this. Suppose we assume the literal truth of the Adam story, our connection with Adam is purely physical. We have no choice whatever in the matter, any more than a child chooses his father. On the other hand our connection with Christ is voluntary. Union with Christ is something a man can accept or reject. The connection is in reality quite different. That is a serious flaw in Paul's argument.

(ii) The great virtue is this. Paul conserves the truth that mankind was involved in a situation from which there was no escape; sin had man in its power and there was no hope. Into this situation came Jesus Christ, and he brought with him something that broke the old deadlock. By what he did, by what he is, by what he gives, he enabled man to escape from a situation in which he was hopelessly dominated by sin. Whatever else we may say about Paul's argument, it is completely true that man was ruined by sin and rescued by Christ.

-Barclay's Daily Study Bible (NT)

Bibliographical Information
Barclay, William. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "William Barclay's Daily Study Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​dsb/​romans-5.html. 1956-1959.

Gann's Commentary on the Bible

Romans 5:1

Therefore -- οὖν oun Since we are thus justified, or as a consequence of being justified, we have peace.

“Therefore” introduces the practical conclusion to be drawn from the presentation of grace in 3:21-4:25.

Note Paul’s use of "grace and peace" (Romans 1:5-6, and all his epistle introductions) for this is who he is! Faith, grace, peace, hope, is an outflow of all that Paul has gone through! - SW

justified by faith -- Romans 3:24; Romans 4:5.

"Since we have been justified through faith” sums up the main point of that passage and states the heart of grace. The verb is aorist (past) tense, indicating that justification is an event that has already occurred in the experience of Paul’s Christian readers.

we -- That is, all who are justified. The apostle is evidently speaking of true Christians.

peace -- Peace here is not a subjective feeling of peace. Rather, this peace is the state of being at peace instead of at war. The hostility between God and the believer has ceased. The believer has been reconciled to God. - NNIBC

The only way is peace is faith, grace, hope! Paul has been through all that. - SW

peace with God -- religion is often represented as peace with God; see Acts 10:36; Romans 8:6; Romans 10:15; Romans 14:17; Galatians 5:22; see also Isaiah 32:17.

1) The sinner is represented as the enemy of God, Romans 8:7; Ephesians 2:16; James 4:4; John 15:18, John 15:24; John 17:14; Romans 1:30. Isaiah 59:2

(2) The Gospel is God’s plan for reconciliation. He is ready to forgive sin.

through our Lord Jesus Christ -- By means of the atonement of the Lord Jesus. It is his mediation that has procured it.

- - - - - - - - -

[Follow the links from #1 to see Paul’s pictures of salvation, or what the cross has done for us.

[ # 1 Paul’s picture from the Law Courts of Rome

    Rom. 5.1 cf. Jesus’ death, Romans 4:25 we are not treated as criminals, but as if we had done nothing wrong. Acts 13:34 Illustration from Abe Lincoln; Illustration Prodigal son, Luke 15.

    Next: picture of Reconciliation, 2 Corinthians 5:18-20 ]

What We Have Thru Christ

    1. Peace -- Romans 1:7; Romans 5:1

    2. Grace -- use this grace, Romans 1:7; Romans 5:2

    3. Hope -- Romans 5:2 Romans 5:4

    4. Joy -- Romans 5:2 glory (rejoice) in tribulation, Romans 5:3

    5. Love -- Romans 5:5

Bibliographical Information
Gann, Windell. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". Gann's Commentary on the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​gbc/​romans-5.html. 2021.

Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible

Therefore being justified by faith,.... Not that faith is at the first of our justification; for that is a sentence which passed in the mind of God from all eternity, and which passed on Christ, and on all the elect considered in him, when he rose from the dead; see Romans 4:25; nor is it the chief, or has it the chief place in justification; it is not the efficient cause of it, it is God that justifies, and not faith; it is not the moving cause of it, that is the free grace of God; it is not the matter of it, that is the righteousness of Christ: we are not justified by faith, either as God's work in us, for, as such, it is a part of sanctification; nor as our work or act, as exercised by us, for then we should be justified by works, by something of our own, and have whereof to glory; but we are justified by faith objectively and relatively, as that relates to the object Christ, and his righteousness; or as it is a means of our knowledge, and perception of our justification by Christ's righteousness, and of our enjoying the comfort of it; and so we come to

have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. The apostle having set the doctrine of justification in a clear light, and fully proved that it is not by the works of men, but by the righteousness of God; and having mentioned the several causes of it, proceeds to consider its effects, among which, peace with God stands in the first place; and is so called, to distinguish it from peace with men, which persons, though justified by faith in Christ's righteousness, may not have; but are sure, having a sense of this, to find peace with God, even with him against whom they have sinned, whose law they have transgressed, and whose justice they have affronted; reconciliation for sin being made, and a justifying righteousness brought in, and this imputed and applied to them, they have that "peace of God", that tranquillity and serenity of mind, the same with "peace with God" here, "which passes all understanding", Philippians 4:7; and is better experienced than expressed: and this is all through our Lord Jesus Christ; it springs from his atoning sacrifice, and precious blood, by which he has made peace; and is communicated through the imputation of his righteousness, and the application of his blood; and is only felt and enjoyed in a way of believing, by looking to him as the Lord our righteousness.

Bibliographical Information
Gill, John. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​geb/​romans-5.html. 1999.

Henry's Complete Commentary on the Bible

Justification and Its Effects. A. D. 58.

      1 Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:   2 By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.   3 And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience;   4 And patience, experience; and experience, hope:   5 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.

      The precious benefits and privileges which flow from justification are such as should quicken us all to give diligence to make it sure to ourselves that we are justified, and then to take the comfort it renders to us, and to do the duty it calls for from us. The fruits of this tree of life are exceedingly precious.

      I. We have peace with God,Romans 5:1; Romans 5:1. It is sin that breeds the quarrel between us and God, creates not only a strangeness, but an enmity; the holy righteous God cannot in honour be at peace with a sinner while he continues under the guilt of sin. Justification takes away the guilt, and so makes way for peace. And such are the benignity and good-will of God to man that, immediately upon the removing of that obstacle, the peace is made. By faith we lay hold of God's arm and of his strength, and so are at peace, Isaiah 27:4; Isaiah 27:5. There is more in this peace than barely a cessation of enmity, there is friendship and loving-kindness, for God is either the worst enemy or the best friend. Abraham, being justified by faith, was called the friend of God (James 2:23), which was his honour, but not his peculiar honour: Christ has called his disciples friends,John 15:13-15. And surely a man needs no more to make him happy than to have God his friend! But this is through our Lord Jesus Christ--through him as the great peace-maker, the Mediator between God and man, that blessed Day's-man that has laid his hand upon us both. Adam, in innocency, had peace with God immediately; there needed no such mediator. But to guilty sinful man it is a very dreadful thing to think of God out of Christ; for he is our peace,Ephesians 2:14, not only the maker, but the matter and maintainer, of our peace, Colossians 1:20.

      II. We have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand,Romans 5:2; Romans 5:2. This is a further privilege, not only peace, but grace, that is, this favour. Observe, 1. The saints' happy state. It is a state of grace, God's loving-kindness to us and our conformity to God; he that hath God's love and God's likeness is in a state of grace. Now into this grace we have access prosagogen--an introduction, which implies that we were not born in this state; we are by nature children of wrath, and the carnal mind is enmity against God; but we are brought into it. We could not have got into it of ourselves, nor have conquered the difficulties in the way, but we have a manuduction, a leading by the hand,--are led into it as blind, or lame, or weak people are led,--are introduced as pardoned offenders,--are introduced by some favourite at court to kiss the king's hand, as strangers, that are to have audience, are conducted. Prosagogen eschekamen--We have had access. He speaks of those that have been already brought out of a state of nature into a state of grace. Paul, in his conversion, had this access; then he was made nigh. Barnabas introduced him to the apostles (Acts 9:27), and there were others that led him by the hand to Damascus (Romans 5:8; Romans 5:8), but it was Christ that introduced and led him by the hand into this grace. By whom we have access by faith. By Christ as the author and principal agent, by faith as the means of this access. Not by Christ in consideration of any merit or desert of ours, but in consideration of our believing dependence upon him and resignation of ourselves to him. 2. Their happy standing in this state: wherein we stand. Not only wherein we are, but wherein we stand, a posture that denotes our discharge from guilt; we stand in the judgment (Psalms 1:5), not cast, as convicted criminals, but our dignity and honour secured, not thrown to the ground, as abjects. The phrase denotes also our progress; while we stand, we are going. We must not lie down, as if we had already attained, but stand as those that are pressing forward, stand as servants attending on Christ our master. The phrase denotes, further, our perseverance: we stand firmly and safely, upheld by the power of God; stand as soldiers stand, that keep their ground, not borne down by the power of the enemy. It denotes not only our admission to, but our confirmation in, the favour of God. It is not in the court of heaven as in earthly courts, where high places are slippery places: but we stand in a humble confidence of this very thing that he who has begun the good work will perform it,Philippians 1:6.

      III. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Besides the happiness in hand, there is a happiness in hope, the glory of God, the glory which God will put upon the saints in heaven, glory which will consist in the vision and fruition of God. 1. Those, and those only, that have access by faith into the grace of God now may hope for the glory of God hereafter. There is no good hope of glory but what is founded in grace; grace is glory begun, the earnest and assurance of glory. He will give grace and glory,Psalms 84:11. 2. Those who hope for the glory of God hereafter have enough to rejoice in now. It is the duty of those that hope for heaven to rejoice in that hope.

      IV. We glory in tribulations also; not only notwithstanding our tribulations (these do not hinder our rejoicing in hope of the glory of God), but even in our tribulations, as they are working for us the weight of glory, 2 Corinthians 4:17. Observe, What a growing increasing happiness the happiness of the saints is: Not only so. One would think such peace, such grace, such glory, and such a joy in hope of it, were more than such poor undeserving creatures as we are could pretend to; and yet it is not only so: there are more instances of our happiness--we glory in tribulations also, especially tribulations for righteousness' sake, which seemed the greatest objection against the saints' happiness, whereas really their happiness did not only consist with, but take rise from, those tribulations. They rejoiced that they were counted worthy to suffer,Acts 5:41. This being the hardest point, he sets himself to show the grounds and reasons of it. How come we to glory in tribulations? Why, because tribulations, by a chain of causes, greatly befriend hope, which he shows in the method of its influence. 1. Tribulation worketh patience, not in and of itself, but the powerful grace of God working in and with the tribulation. It proves, and by proving improves, patience, as parts and gifts increase by exercise. It is not the efficient cause, but yields the occasion, as steel is hardened by the fire. See how God brings meat out of the eater, and sweetness out of the strong. That which worketh patience is matter of joy; for patience does us more good than tribulations can do us hurt. Tribulation in itself worketh impatience; but, as it is sanctified to the saints, it worketh patience. 2. Patience experience,Romans 5:4; Romans 5:4. It works an experience of God, and the songs he gives in the night; the patient sufferers have the greatest experience of the divine consolations, which abound as afflictions abound. It works an experience of ourselves. It is by tribulation that we make an experiment of our own sincerity, and therefore such tribulations are called trials. It works, dokimen--an approbation, as he is approved that has passed the test. Thus Job's tribulation wrought patience, and that patience produced an approbation, that still he holds fast his integrity,Job 2:3. 3. Experience hope. He who, being thus tried, comes forth as gold, will thereby be encouraged to hope. This experiment, or approbation, is not so much the ground, as the evidence, of our hope, and a special friend to it. Experience of God is a prop to our hope; he that hath delivered doth and will. Experience of ourselves helps to evidence our sincerity. 4. This hope maketh not ashamed; that is, it is a hope that will not deceive us. Nothing confounds more than disappointment. Everlasting shame and confusion will be caused by the perishing of the expectation of the wicked, but the hope of the righteous shall be gladness,Proverbs 10:28. See Psalms 22:5; Psalms 71:1. Or, It maketh not ashamed of our sufferings. Though we are counted as the offscouring of all things, and trodden under foot as the mire in the streets, yet, having hopes of glory, we are not ashamed of these sufferings. It is in a good cause, for a good Master, and in good hope; and therefore we are not ashamed. We will never think ourselves disparaged by sufferings that are likely to end so well. Because the love of God is shed abroad. This hope will not disappoint us, because it is sealed with the Holy Spirit as a Spirit of love. It is the gracious work of the blessed Spirit to shed abroad the love of God in the hearts of all the saints. The love of God, that is, the sense of God's love to us, drawing out love in us to him again. Or, The great effects of his love: (1.) Special grace; and, (2.) The pleasant gust or sense of it. It is shed abroad, as sweet ointment, perfuming the soul, as rain watering it and making it fruitful. The ground of all our comfort and holiness, and perseverance in both, is laid in the shedding abroad of the love of God in our hearts; it is this which constrains us, 2 Corinthians 5:14. Thus are we drawn and held by the bonds of love. Sense of God's love to us will make us not ashamed, either of our hope in him or our sufferings for him.

Bibliographical Information
Henry, Matthew. "Complete Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Henry's Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​mhm/​romans-5.html. 1706.

Spurgeon's Verse Expositions of the Bible

Justification by Faith

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A Sermon

(No. 3392)

Published on Thursday, February 5th, 1914.

Delivered by

C. H. SPURGEON,

At the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington.

On Lord's Day Evening, April 28th, 1867.

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"Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." Romans 5:1 .

WE DESIRE this evening not to preach upon this text as a mere matter of doctrine. You all believe and understand the gospel of justification by faith, but we want to preach upon it tonight as a matter of experience, as a thing realized, felt, enjoyed, and understood in the soul. I trust there are many here who not only know that men may be saved and justified by faith, but who can say in their own experience, "Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ," and who are now at the present moment walking and living in the actual enjoyment of that peace.

Wishing to speak of the text, then, in this sense, I shall ask you to accompany me, not only with your ears, and with the attention which you usually give so generously, but also with the eye of your self- examination, asking yourselves, as we proceed step by step, "Do I know that? Have I received that? Have I been taught of God in this matter? Have I been led into that truth?" And our hope will be that some person to whom these things have hitherto been merely external, and therefore valueless, may be led by God to get hold of them, so that they may be matters of soul, and heart, and conscience, so that they may enjoy them, and find themselves where once they feared they would never be, namely, in a state of reconciliation with God, happily enjoying peace with the Most High.

Our first few thoughts shall be some plain, earnest talk concerning:

I. A FEW PRELIMINARY DISCOVERIES WHICH A MAN MAKES BEFORE HE GETS PEACE WITH GOD.

These, I do not think, are by any means foreign to the text, or merely imported to it, but belong rightfully to it. You see that Paul, before he came to this justification by faith, had been speaking about sin. It would not have been possible for him to have given an intelligible definition of justification without mentioning that men are sinners, without informing them that they had broken God's holy law, and that the law, by and of itself, could never restore them to the favour of God. Now, some of these things of which I am going to speak are absolutely necessary, if not to my sermon, yet certainly to your spiritually understanding even so much as one jot or tittle of what it is to be justified by faith.

Well, then, what are these things? The first discovery that a man is led by the Spirit of God to make before he is justified is, that it is important to be justified in the sight of God. Many people do not know this. You shall step into a shop this evening, and find a man at the counter, and you say to him, "Well, do you never go to a place of worship?" "No," he would say, "but I am quite as good as those who do." "How so?" "Well, I am a great deal better than some of them." "How is that?" "Well, I never failed in business; I never duped people in a limited liability company; I never told lies; I am no thief; I am not a drunkard; I am as honest as the days are long in the middle of June; and that is more than you can say of some of your religious people." Now, that man has got a hold of one part of a good man's character. There are two parts, but he can only see one, namely, that man is to be just to man. He sees that, but he does not see that man is to be also just to God. And yet if that man were really to think a little while, he would see that the highest obligations of a creature must be, not to his fellow-creatures, but to his Creator, and that, however just a man may be to another man, yet if he be altogether unjust to God, he cannot escape without the severest penalty. But oh! the most of men think that so long as they keep the laws of the land, so long as they give to their fellow-men their due, it matters not though God's day should be a subject of scorn, God's will be used as men will, and God's law trodden under their feet. Now, I think that everyone here who will but put his fingers to his brow for a moment and think, that he will see that, even though a man may go before the bar of his country, and say before any judge or jury, "I have in nothing injured my fellow-man; I am just before men," yet it does not make the man's character perfect. Unless he is also able to say, "And I am also just before the presence of the God who made me, and whose servant I am," he has only kept one half, and that the less important, of God's law for him.

It cannot help being, it must be, important to the highest degree that you and I should stand on good terms with the great God unto whom we shall so soon return in the great day when he shall say, "Return ye children of men." We must then render up our souls to him who created us. Well, you can surely go as far as that with me that it is necessary. You do feel, do you not, a desire in your heart to be just before your Maker? I am thankful that you can go so far.

The next thing is this. A man, when the Spirit of God is bringing him to Christ, discovers that his past life has been marred badly, by serious offences against the law of God. Before the Spirit of God comes into our soul, we are like being in a room in the dark: we cannot see in it. We cannot discover the cobwebs, the spiders, the foul and loathsome things that may be lurking there. But when the Spirit of God comes streaming into the soul, the man is astonished to find that he is what he is, and especially if he sits down and opens the book of the law, and, in the light of the divine Spirit, reads that perfect law, and compares with it his own imperfect heart and life. He will then grow sick of himself, even to loathing and, sometimes, despair. Take but one command. Perhaps there are some here who will say, "I know I have been very chaste all my life, for the command saith, 'Thou shalt not commit adultery,' and I have never broken it; I am clean there." Ay, but now hear Christ explain the command, "He that looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." Now, then, who amongst us can say that we have not done that? Who is there upon earth, if that be the meaning of the command, who can say, "I am innocent?" If the law of God, as we are told by Scripture, has to deal, not with our outward actions alone, but with our words, and with our thoughts, and with our imaginations if it is so exceeding broad that it applies to the most secret part of a man, then who of us can plead guiltless before the throne? No, dear brethren, this must be understood by you, and by me, before we can be justified, that we are full of sin. What if I say that we are as full of sin as an egg is full of meat? We are all sin. The imagination and the thought of our heart is evil, and only evil, and that continually. If some of you plume yourselves with the notion that you are righteous, I pray God to pluck those fine feathers off you and make you see yourselves, for if you never see your own nothingness, you will never understand Christ's all-sufficiency. Unless you are pulled down, Christ will never lift you up. Unless you know yourselves to be lost, you will never care for that Saviour who came "to seek and to save the lost." That is a second discovery, then; that it is important to be just before God, but that on account of the spirituality of God's moral law, and our consequent inability to keep it perfectly, we are very far from standing in that position.

Then there comes another discovery, namely, that consequently it is utterly impossible for us to hope that we ever can be just before God, on the footing of our own doing. We must give it up now, as an utterly lost case. The past is past: that can never be by us blotted out, and the present, inasmuch as we are weak through the flesh, is not much better than the past; and the future, notwithstanding all our fond hopes of improvement, will probably be none the better, and so salvation by the works of the law becomes to us a dreary impossibility. The law said, "Cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them." I was conversing on one occasion with one of our most illustrious Jewish noblemen, and when I put to him the question he believed himself to be perfectly righteous, and I believe if any man could be so by his moral conduct, he might have fairly laid claim to it; but when I said to him, "Now, there is your own law for it, 'Cursed is everyone that continueth not in all things written in the book of the law to do them': have you continued in all things?" he said, "I have not." "Then," I said, "the curse is upon you: how do you hope to escape from it?" and I found that to be a question for which he, at any rate, had no answer; and it is a question which, when properly understood, no man can answer, except by pointing to the cross of Christ and saying, "He was made a curse for us that we might be made a blessing." Unless you and I keep the law of God perfectly, it matters little how near we get to perfection. It is as though God had committed to our trust a perfect crystal vase, and had said, "If you keep that whole, and present it to me, you shall have a reward." But we have cracked it, chipped it; ah! my brethren, the most of us have broken it and smashed it to pieces. But we will suppose that we have only cracked it a little. Yes, but even then we have lost the reward, for the condition was that it should be perfectly whole, and the slightest chip is a violation of the condition upon which the reward would have been given. Never you say that you will not break it farther. Nay, but you have broken it. You have thrown yourselves now out of the list. It sometimes seems hard when you tell people that if they have violated the law in one point, they have broken the whole of it; but it is not so hard as it looks to be, for if I tell a man who is going down a coal- mine on a long chain that, if he shall break one link of the chain, it does not matter, though all the other hundreds or thousands of links may be sound; if there is only one link that is broken, down will descend the basket, and the poor miner be dashed to pieces. Nobody thinks that hard. Everybody recognizes that as being a matter of mechanical law, that the strength of a chain must be measured by its weakest part. And so the strength of our obedience must be gauged by the very point in which it fails. Alas! our obedience has failed, and, through it, no one of us can ever be just before God.

Now, I want to stop a minute, and put the question round the galleries, and below stairs. Have you all got as far as that? It is important to be just before God: we see that we are not so: do we see that we cannot be so? Are we quite convinced that by our own obedience to the law of God, it is hopeless for us to think of standing accepted before the Most High? I pray the Eternal Spirit to convince you all of this, or you will keep on knocking at the door until you are quite sure that God has nailed it up for ever, and you will go scrambling over that Alp, and tumbling down this precipice, until you are convinced that it is impossible for you to climb it, and then you will give up your desperate endeavour and come to God in God's way, which is quite another way from your own. I trust that we are all convinced of this.

Let us notice one more preliminary discovery. A man, having found out all this, suddenly discovers that, inasmuch as he is not just before God, and cannot be, he is at the present moment under condemnation. God is never indifferent towards sin. If, therefore, a man be not in a state in which God can justify him, he is in a state in which God must condemn him. If you are not just before God, you are condemned at this very moment. You are not executed, it is true, but the condemnation has gone forth against you, and the sign that it is so is your unbelief, for "He that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed on the Son of God." How some of you would spring up from your seats tonight if all on a sudden you got the information that you had been condemned by the courts of your country; but when I say that you have been condemned by the Court of Heaven, this glides across your conscience like drops of water or oil over a marble slab. And yet, my hearers, if thou didst but know the meaning of what I am saying and I pray God the Holy Ghost to make thee know it it would make thy very bones to quiver! God has condemned thee. Thou art out of Christ. Thou hast broken his law. God has lifted his hand to smite thee, and, though his mercy tarries for awhile, yet days and hours will soon be gone, and then the condemnation shall take the shape of execution, and where will thy soul be then? Now, you must have the sentence of condemnation passed in your own soul, or else you will never be justified, for until we are condemned by ourselves we are not acquitted by God. Again, I pause and say, Dost thou feel this, my dear hearer? If thou dost, instead of despairing, be hopeful. If thou hast the sentence of death within thee, be thankful for it, for now shall life be given thee from the hand of God's grace.

Having occupied, perhaps, too much time over that, we now come more immediately into the text to:

II. SHOW THE GOSPEL LEARNING WHICH IS TAUGHT TO US BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD.

That gospel learning I may give you in a few sentences, namely, these: that, inasmuch as through man's sin, the way of obedience is for ever closed, so that we none of us can ever pass by it to a true righteousness, God has now determined to deal with men in a way of mercy, to forgive them all their offences, to bestow upon them his love, to receive them graciously, and to love them freely. He has been pleased, in his infinite wisdom, to devise a way by which without injury to his justice, he can yet receive the most undeserving sons of men into his heart, and make them his children, and can bless them with all the blessings which would have been theirs had they perfectly kept God's law, but which now shall come to them as a matter of gift and undeserved grace from himself.

I trust we have learned that; that there is a plan of salvation by grace, and by grace alone; and it is a great thing to know that where grace is, there are no works.

It is a blessed thing never to muddle in your head the doctrine of working, and the doctrine of receiving by grace, for there is an essential and eternal difference between the two. I hope you all know that there can be no mixing of the two. If we are saved by grace, it cannot be by our own merits, but if we depend upon our own merits, then we cannot appeal to the grace of God, since the two things can never be mingled together. It must be all works or else all grace. Now, God's plan of salvation excludes all our works. "Not of works, lest any man should boast." It comes to us upon the footing of grace, pure grace alone. And this is God's plan, namely, that, inasmuch as we cannot be saved by our own obedience, we should be saved by Christ's obedience. Jesus, the Son of God, has appeared in the flesh, has lived a life of obedience to God's law, and in consequence of that obedience, being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, and our Saviour's life and death make up a complete keeping and honouring of that law which we have broken and dishonoured, and God's plan is this: "I cannot bless you for your own sakes, but I will bless you for his sake; and now, looking at you through him, I can bless you though you deserve it not; I can pass by your undeserving; I can blot out your sins like a cloud, and cast your iniquities into the depths of the sea through what he has done; you have no merits, but he has boundless merits; you are full of sin and must be punished, but he has been punished instead of you, and now I can deal with you." This is the language of God, put into human words, "I can deal with you upon terms of mercy through the merits of my dear Son." This is the way in which the gospel comes to you, then. If you believe in Jesus, that is to say, if you trust him, all the merits of Jesus are your merits, are imputed to you: all the sufferings of Jesus are your sufferings. Everyone of his merits is imputed to you. You stand before God as if you were Christ, because Christ stood before God as if he were you he in your stead, you in his stead. Substitution! that is the word! Christ the Substitute for sinners: Christ standing for men, and bearing the thunderbolts of the divine opposition to all sin, he "being made sin for us who knew no sin." Man standing in Christ's place, and receiving the sunlight of divine favour, instead of Christ.

And this, I say, is through trusting, or believing. God's way of your getting connection with Christ is through your reliance upon him. "Therefore, being justified" how? Not by works; that is not the link, but "being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." Christ offers to God the substitution: through faith we accept it: and from that moment God accepts us.

Now, I want to come to this, dear friends. Do you know this? Have you been taught this by the Spirit of God? Perhaps you learned it in the Assembly's Catechism when you were but children: you have learned it in the various classes since then, but do you know it in your own soul, and do you know that God's way of salvation is through a simple dependence upon his dear Son? Do you so know it that you have accepted it, and that you are now resting upon Jesus? If so, then thrice happy are you!

But, going further, I have now to dwell for a minute or two upon:

III. THE GLORIOUS PRIVILEGE OF THE TEXT.

We have led you, and I hope the Spirit of God has led you, too, through the preliminary discoveries, and through the great discovery that God can save us through the merits of another, and now let us notice this glorious privilege word by word.

"Being justified." The text tells us that every believing man is at the present moment perfectly justified before God. You know what Adam was in naked innocence in Paradise. Such is every believer. Ay, and more than that. Adam could talk with God because he was pure from sin, and we also have access with boldness unto God our Father because, through Jesus' blood, we are clean. Now, I do not say that this is the privilege of a few eminent saints, but here I look around these pews and see my brethren and sisters scores and hundreds of them all of whom are tonight just before God perfectly so; completely so; so just that they never can be otherwise than just; so just that even in heaven they will be no more acceptable to God than they are here tonight. That is the state into which faith brings a poor, lost, guilty, helpless, good-for- nothing sinner. The man may have been everything that was bad before he believed in Jesus, but as soon as he trusted Christ, the merits of Christ became his merits, and he stands before God as though he were perfect, "without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing," through the righteousness of Christ.

Note, however, as we have noticed the state of justification, the means whereby we reach it. "Being justified by faith." The way of reaching this state of justification is not by tears, nor prayers, nor humblings, nor working, nor Bible-reading, nor church-going, nor chapel-going, nor sacraments, nor priestly absolution, but by faith, which faith is a simple and utter dependence and believing in the faithfulness of God, a dependence upon the promise of God, because it is God's promise, and is worthy of dependence. It is a reliance with all our might upon what God has said. This is faith, and every man who possesses this faith is perfectly justified tonight.

I know what the devil will say to you. He will say to you, "You are a sinner!" Tell him you know you are, but that for all that you are justified. He will tell you of the greatness of your sin. Tell him of the greatness of Christ's righteousness. He will tell you of all your mishaps and your backslidings, of your offences and your wanderings. Tell him, and tell your own conscience, that you know all that, but that Jesus Christ came to save sinners, and that, although your sin be great, Christ is quite able to put it all away. Some of you, it seems to me, do not trust in Christ as sinners. You get a mingle-mangle kind of faith. You trust in Christ as though you thought Christ could do something for you, and you could do the rest. I tell you that while you look to yourselves, you do not know what faith means. You must be convinced that there is nothing good in yourselves; you must know that you are sinners, and that in your hearts you are as big and as black sinners as the very worst and vilest, and you must come to Jesus, and leave your fancied righteousnesses, and your pretended goodnesses behind you, and you must take him for everything, and trust in him. Oh! to feel your sin, and yet to know your righteousness to have the two together repentance on account of sin, and yet a glorious confidence in the all-atoning sacrifice! Oh! if you could understand that saying of the spouse, "I am black, but comely" for that is where we must come black in myself, as black as hell, and yet comely, fair, lovely, inexpressibly glorious through the righteousness of Jesus.

My dear brethren and sisters, can you feel this? If you cannot feel it, do you believe it? And do you sing in the words of Joseph Hart?:

"In thy surety thou art free,

His dear hands were pierced for thee;

With thy Saviour's vesture on,

Holy as the holy one."

For so it is: you stand before God as accepted as Christ is accepted: and notwithstanding the inbred sin and corruption of your heart, you are as dear to God as Christ is dear, and as accepted in the righteousness of Christ as Christ is accepted in his own obedience.

Have we got so far? That is the point on which I want to enquire this evening. Have you got as far as to know at this moment that it is through faith we are justified? If so, I shall conduct you just one step farther, namely, to observe and this is coming back, whilst it is also going forward that "we are justified by faith through our Lord Jesus Christ." There is the foundation: there is the mainspring. There is the tree that bears the fruit. We are justified by faith, but not by faith of itself. Faith in itself is a precious grace, but it cannot in itself justify us. It is "through our Lord Jesus Christ." Simple as the observation is, I must venture to repeat it tonight, because it is hard for us to keep it in mind. But remember that faith is not the work of the Spirit within, but the work of Christ upon the tree. That upon which I must rest as my meritorious hope is not the blessed fact that I am now an heir of heaven, but the still more blessed fact that the Son of God loved me, and gave himself for me. My dear brethren, when all is fair weather within, there is such a temptation to say, "Well, now, it is all right with me, for I fee this, and I feel that." Very good these evidences are in their places, but evidences, you get equally clear evidences that you are not perfect; when you have to say, "Oh! wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" you will find that, instead of your beautiful evidences, you will have to fly to the cross. There was a time when I, too, could take a great deal of comfort in what I believe is the Spirit of God's work in my soul I do thank God for it, and bless him for it now but I trust I have learned to walk where poor Jack the huckster walked:

"I'm a poor sinner, and nothing at all;

But Jesus Christ is my all in all."

Brethren, it is down on the ground that we must live. We must build upon the rock itself. On the top of some mountains men sometimes build heaps of timber, so as to get a little higher. Well, now, some of these ricketty platforms, you know, get shaky, but when you get right down on the mountain itself, that never shakes, and you are perfectly secure there. So sometimes we get building up our ricketty platforms of our experience and our good works all very well in their way, but then they shake in the storm. Depend upon it, that the soul that clings to the rock, notwithstanding all that the Holy Spirit has done for it, and having nothing then to depend upon, more than the poor dying robber had when, without a single good work, he had to hang on the dying Christ alone oh! believe me, that soul is in the safest place to live in, Jesus, for a poor sinner when he is torn from his cups and his sins, and none but Jesus for the aged saint when he stays himself upon his bed to bear his last testimony:

"Nothing in my hands I bring:

Simply to thy cross I cling."

"Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ."

And now, to crown all, there is here the precious, precious privilege which such men enjoy "we have peace with God." I know that this may seem a trifle to thoughtless people, but not to those who think. I cannot say that I sympathize with those people who shut their eyes to the beauties of nature. I have heard of good men travelling through fine scenery, and shutting their eyes for fear they should see. I always open mine as wide as ever I can, because I think I can see God in all the works of his hands, and what God has taken the trouble to make I think I ought to take the trouble to look at. Surely there must be something to see in a man's works if he be a wise man; and there must be something worth seeing in the works of God, who is all-wise. Now, it is a delightful thing to say, when you look upon a landscape, lit up with sunlight and shaded with cloud, "Well, my Father made all this; I never saw him, but I do delight in the work of his hands; he made all this, and I am perfectly at peace with him." Then as you are standing there, a storm comes on. Big drops begin to fall. There is thunder in the distance. It begins to peal louder and louder. Presently there comes a lightning's flash. Now, those who are not at peace with God may go and flee away, but those who are perfectly at peace with him may stand there and say, "Well, it is my Father who is doing all this; that is his voice; the voice of the Lord, which is full of majesty." I love to hear my Father's voice. I never am so happy as in a tremendous storm, and when the lightning flash comes, I think Well, it is only the flashing of my Father's eye: now, God is abroad: he seemed as if he had left the world before, but now he comes riding on the wings of the wind; let me go and meet him. I am not afraid! Suppose you are out at sea in a storm. You are justified by faith, and you say, "Well, let the waves roar; let them clap their hands: my Father holds the waters in the hollow of his hand, why should I be afraid?" Let me say to you that it is worth something to believe that God can put us in a calm state of mind when "earth is all in arms abroad." It is just so with the believer when temporal troubles come. There comes crash after crash until it seems as though every house of business would come down. Nothing is certain. Man has lost confidence and reliance in his fellow-man. Everything is going to the bad. But the Christian says, "God is at the helm; the whole business of business is managed by the great King: let the sons of earth do as they will, but:

"He everywhere hath sway,

And all things serve his might."

It is something to feel that my Father cannot do me a bad turn. Even if he should use his rod upon me, it will do me good, and I will thank him for it, for I am at perfect peace with him.

And then to come to die, and to feel, "I am going to God, and I am glad to go, for I am not going like a prisoner to a judge, but like a wife espoused goes to her husband, like a child home from school to the parents' arms. Oh! it is something to die with a sense of peace with God! Surely every thoughtful man will feel that. Now, if you trust Christ, you shall be justified by faith. Being justified, your heart shall feel that perfect peace is brought into it, so that you shall meet your Father's will with perfect equanimity, let it be what it may. Come life, come death, it shall not matter to you, for all is right between God and your souls.

Oh! I wish it were so with all present! It may be so if God the Spirit bring you to rest in Jesus. Nay, it shall be so, my dear friend; it shall be so with you tonight; though you never thought it would be when you came in here, yet you see it all now. It is simply believing, simply trusting. Oh! believe him! Trust him, and it shall be the joy of your soul to have a peace with God which, as the world did not give you, so the world shall never take away, but you shall have it for ever and ever. God grant it to each one of us! Amen.

Bibliographical Information
Spurgeon, Charle Haddon. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". "Spurgeon's Verse Expositions of the Bible". https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​spe/​romans-5.html. 2011.

Kelly Commentary on Books of the Bible

The circumstances under which the epistle to the Romans was written gave occasion to the most thorough and comprehensive unfolding, not of the church, but of Christianity. No apostle had ever yet visited Rome. There was somewhat as yet lacking to the saints there; but even this was ordered of God to call forth from the Holy Ghost an epistle which more than any other approaches a complete treatise on the fundamentals of Christian doctrine, and especially as to righteousness.

Would we follow up the heights of heavenly truth, would we sound the depths of Christian experience, would we survey the workings of the Spirit of God in the Church, would we bow before the glories of the person of Christ, or learn His manifold offices, we must look elsewhere in the writings of the New Testament no doubt, but elsewhere rather than here.

The condition of the Roman saints called for a setting forth of the gospel of God; but this object, in order to be rightly understood and appreciated, leads the apostle into a display of the condition of man. We have God and man in presence, so to speak. Nothing can be more simple and essential. Although there is undoubtedly that profoundness which must accompany every revelation of God, and especially in connection with Christ as now manifested, still we have God adapting Himself to the very first wants of a renewed soul nay, even to the wretchedness of souls without God, without any real knowledge either of themselves or of Him. Not, of course, that the Roman saints were in this condition; but that God, writing by the apostle to them, seizes the opportunity to lay bare man's state as well as His own grace.

Romans 1:1-32. From the very first we have these characteristics of the epistle disclosing themselves. The apostle writes with the full assertion of his own apostolic dignity, but as a servant also. "Paul, a bondman of Jesus Christ" an apostle "called," not born, still less as educated or appointed of man, but an apostle "called," as he says "separated unto the gospel of God, which he had promised afore by his prophets." The connection is fully owned with that which had been from God of old. No fresh revelations from God can nullify those which preceded them; but as the prophets looked onward to what was coming, so is the gospel already come, supported by the past. There is mutual confirmation. Nevertheless, what is in nowise the same as what was or what will be. The past prepared the way, as it is said here, "which God had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures, concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, [here we have the great central object of God's gospel, even the person of Christ, God's Son,] which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh" (ver. 3). This last relation was the direct subject of the prophetic testimony, and Jesus had come accordingly. He was the promised Messiah, born King of the Jews.

But there was far more in Jesus. He was "declared," says the apostle, "to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead" ( ἐξ ἀναστάσεως νεκρῶν , ver. 4). It was the Son of God not merely as dealing with the powers of the earth, Jehovah's King on the holy hill of Zion, but after a far deeper manner. For, essentially associated as He is with the glory of God the Father, the full deliverance of souls from the realm of death was His also. In this too we have the blessed connection of the Spirit (here peculiarly designated, for special reasons, "the Spirit of holiness"). That same energy of the Holy Ghost which had displayed itself in Jesus, when He walked in holiness here below, was demonstrated in resurrection; and not merely in His own rising from the dead, but in raising such at any time no doubt, though most signally and triumphantly displayed in His own resurrection.

The bearing of this on the contents and main doctrine of the epistle will appear abundantly by-and-by. Let me refer in passing to a few points more in the introduction, in order to link them together with that which the Spirit was furnishing to the Roman saints, as well as to show the admirable perfectness of every word that inspiration has given us. I do not mean by this its truth merely, but its exquisite suitability; so that the opening address commences the theme in hand, and insinuates that particular line of truth which the Holy Spirit sees fit to pursue throughout. To this then the apostle comes, after having spoken of the divine favour shown himself, both when a sinner, and now in his own special place of serving the Lord Jesus. "By whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith." This was no question of legal obedience, although the law came from Jehovah. Paul's joy and boast were in the gospel of God. So therefore it addressed itself to the obedience of faith; not by this meaning practice, still less according to the measure of a man's duty, but that which is at the root of all practice faith-obedience obedience of heart and will, renewed by divine grace, which accepts the truth of God. To man this is the hardest of all obedience; but when once secured, it leads peacefully into the obedience of every day. If slurred over, as it too often is in souls, it invariably leaves practical obedience lame, and halt, and blind.

It was for this then that Paul describes himself as apostle. And as it is for obedience of faith, it was not in anywise restricted to the Jewish people "among all nations, for his (Christ's) name: among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ" (verses 5, 6). He loved even here at the threshold to show the breadth of God's grace. If he was called, so were they he an apostle, they not apostles but saints; but still, for them as for him, all flowed out of the same mighty love, of God. "To all that be at Rome, beloved of God, called saints" (ver. 7). To these then he wishes, as was his wont, the fresh flow of that source and stream of divine blessing which Christ has made to be household bread to us: "Grace and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ" (ver. 7). Then, from ver. 8, after thanking God through Jesus for their faith spoken of everywhere, and telling them of his prayers for them, he briefly discloses the desire of his heart about them his long-cherished hope according to the grace of the gospel to reach Rome his confidence in the love of God that through him some spiritual gift would be imparted to them, that they might be established, and, according to the spirit of grace which filled his own heart, that he too might be comforted together with them "by the mutual faith both of you and me" (vv. 11, 12). There is nothing like the grace of God for producing the truest humility, the humility that not only descends to the lowest level of sinners to do them good, but which is itself the fruit of deliverance from that self-love which puffs itself or lowers others. Witness the common joy that grace gives an apostle with saints be had never seen, so that even he should be comforted as well as they by their mutual faith. He would not therefore have them ignorant how they had lain on his heart for a visit (ver. 13). He was debtor both to the Greeks and the barbarians, both to the wise and to the unwise; he was ready, as far as he was concerned, to preach the gospel to those that were at Rome also (ver. 14, 15). Even the saints there would have been all the better for the gospel. It was not merely "to those at Rome," but "to you that be at Rome." Thus it is a mistake to suppose that saints may not be benefited by a better understanding of the gospel, at least as Paul preached it. Accordingly he tells them now what reason he had to speak thus strongly, not of the more advanced truths, but of the good news. "For I am not ashamed of the gospel: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek" (ver. 16).

Observe, the gospel is not simply remission of sins, nor is it only peace with God, but "the power of God unto salvation." Now I take this opportunity of pressing on all that are here to beware of contracted views of "salvation." Beware that you do not confound it with souls being quickened, or even brought into joy. Salvation supposes not this only, but a great deal more. There is hardly any phraseology that tends to more injury of souls in these matters than a loose way of talking of salvation. "At any rate he is a saved soul," we hear. "The man has not got anything like settled peace with God; perhaps he hardly knows his sins forgiven; but at least he is a saved soul." Here is an instance of what is so reprehensible. This is precisely what salvation does not mean; and I would strongly press it on all that hear me, more particularly on those that have to do with the work of the Lord, and of course ardently desire to labour intelligently; and this not alone for the conversion, but for the establishment and deliverance of souls. Nothing less, I am persuaded, than this full blessing is the line that God has given to those who have followed Christ without the camp, and who, having been set free from the contracted ways of men, desire to enter into the largeness and at the same time the profound wisdom of every word of God. Let us not stumble at the starting-point, but leave room for the due extent and depth of "salvation" in the gospel.

There is no need of dwelling now on "salvation" as employed in the Old Testament, and in some parts of the New, as the gospels and Revelation particularly, where it is used for deliverance in power or even providence and present things. I confine myself to its doctrinal import, and the full Christian sense of the word; and I maintain that salvation signifies that deliverance for the believer which is the full consequence of the mighty work of Christ, apprehended not, of course, necessarily according to all its depth in God's eyes, but at any rate applied to the soul in the power of the Holy Ghost. It is not the awakening of conscience, however real; neither is it the attraction of heart by the grace of Christ, however blessed this may be. We ought therefore to bear in mind, that if a soul be not brought into conscious deliverance as the fruit of divine teaching, and founded on the work of Christ, we are very far from presenting the gospel as the apostle Paul glories in it, and delights that it should go forth. "I am not ashamed," etc.

And he gives his reason: "For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, The just shall live by faith." That is, it is the power of God unto salvation, not because it is victory (which at the beginning of the soul's career would only give importance to man even if possible, which it is not), but because it is "the righteousness of God." It is not God seeking, or man bringing righteousness. In the gospel there is revealed God's righteousness. Thus the introduction opened with Christ's person, and closes with God's righteousness. The law demanded, but could never receive righteousness from man. Christ is come, and has changed all. God is revealing a righteousness of His own in the gospel. It is God who now makes known a righteousness to man, instead of looking for any from man. Undoubtedly there are fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, and God values them I will not say from man, but from His saints; but here it is what, according to the apostle, God has for man. It is for the saints to learn, of course; but it is that which goes out in its own force and necessary aim to the need of man a divine righteousness, which justifies instead of condemning him who believes. It is "the power of God unto salvation." It is for the lost, therefore; for they it is who need salvation; and it is to save not merely to quicken, but to save; and this because in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed.

Hence it is, as he says, herein revealed "from faith," or by faith. It is the same form of expression exactly as in the beginning of Romans 5:1-21 "being justified by faith" ( ἐκ πίστεως ). But besides this he adds "to faith." The first of these phrases, "from faith," excludes the law; the second, "to faith," includes every one that has faith within the scope of God's righteousness. Justification is not from works of law. The righteousness of God is revealed from faith; and consequently, if there be faith in any soul, to this it is revealed, to faith wherever it may be. Hence, therefore, it was in no way limited to any particular nation, such as those that had already been under the law and government of God. It was a message that went out from God to sinners as such. Let man be what he might, or where he might, God's good news was for man. And to this agreed the testimony of the prophet. "The just shall live by faith" (not by law). Even where the law was, not by it but by faith the just lived. Did Gentiles believe? They too should live. Without faith there is neither justice nor life that God owns; where faith is, the rest will surely follow.

This accordingly leads the apostle into the earlier portion of his great argument, and first of all in a preparatory way. Here we pass out of the introduction of the epistle. "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness" (ver. 18). This is what made the gospel to be so sweet and precious, and, what is more, absolutely necessary, if he would escape certain and eternal ruin. There is no hope for man otherwise; for the gospel is not all that is now made known. Not only is God's righteousness revealed, but also His wrath. It is not said to be revealed in the gospel. The gospel means His glad tidings for man. The wrath of God could not possibly be glad tidings. It is true, it is needful for man to learn; but in nowise is it good news. There is then the solemn truth also of divine wrath. It is not yet executed. It is "revealed," and this too "from heaven." There is no question of a people on earth, and of God's wrath breaking out in one form or another against human evil in this life. The earth, or, at least, the Jewish nation, had been familiar with such dealings of God in times past. But now it is "the wrath of God from heaven;" and consequently it is in view of eternal things, and not of those that touch present life on the earth.

Hence, as God's wrath is revealed from heaven, it is against every form of impiety "against all ungodliness." Besides this, which seems to be a most comprehensive expression for embracing every sort and degree of human iniquity, we have one very specifically named. It is against the "unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness." To hold the truth in unrighteousness would be no security. Alas! we know how this was in Israel, how it might be, and has been, in Christendom. God pronounces against the unrighteousness of such; for if the knowledge, however exact, of God's revealed mind was accompanied by no renewal of the heart, if it was without life towards God, all must be vain. Man is only so much the worse for knowing the truth, if he holds it ever so fast with unrighteousness. There are some that find a difficulty here, because the expression "to hold" means holding firmly. But it is quite possible for the unconverted to be tenacious of the truth, yet unrighteous in their ways; and so much the worse for them. Not thus does God deal with souls. If His grace attract, His truth humbles, and leaves no room for vain boasting and self-confidence. What He does is to pierce and penetrate the man's conscience. If one may so say, He thus holds the man, instead of letting the man presume that he is holding fast the truth. The inner man is dealt with, and searched through and through.

Nothing of this is intended in the class that is here brought before us. They are merely persons who plume themselves on their orthodoxy, but in a wholly unrenewed condition. Such men have never been wanting since the truth has shone on this world; still less are they now. But the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against them pre-eminently. The judgments of God will fall on man as man, but the heaviest blows are reserved for Christendom. There the truth is held, and apparently with firmness too. This, however, will be put to the test by-and-by. But for the time it is held fast, though in unrighteousness. Thus the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against (not only the open ungodliness of men, but) the orthodox unrighteousness of those that hold the truth in unrighteousness.

And this leads the apostle into the moral history of man the proof both of his inexcusable guilt, and of his extreme need of redemption. He begins with the great epoch of the dispensations of God (that is, the ages since the flood). We cannot speak of the state of things before the flood as a dispensation. There was a most important trial of man in the person of Adam; but after this, what dispensation was there? What were the principles of it? No man can tell. The truth is, those are altogether mistaken who call it so. But after the flood man as such was put under certain conditions the whole race. Man became the object, first, of general dealings of God under Noah; next, of His special ways in the calling of Abraham and of his family. And what led to the call of Abraham, of whom we hear much in the epistle to the Romans as elsewhere, was the departure of man into idolatry. Man despised at first the outward testimony of God, His eternal power and Godhead, in the creation above and around him (verses 19, 20). Moreover, He gave up the knowledge of God that had been handed down from father to son (ver. 21). The downfall of man, when he thus abandoned God, was most rapid and profound; and the Holy Spirit traces this solemnly to the end ofRomans 1:1-32; Romans 1:1-32 with no needless words, in a few energetic strokes summing up that which is abundantly confirmed (but in how different a manner!) by all that remains of the ancient world. "Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man," etc. (verses 22-32.) Thus corruption not only overspread morals, but became an integral part of the religion of men, and had thus a quasi-divine sanction. Hence the depravity of the heathen found little or no cheek from conscience, because it was bound up with all that took the shape of God before their mind. There was no part of heathenism practically viewed now, so corrupting as that which had to do with the objects of its worship. Thus, the true God being lost, all was lost, and man's downward career becomes the most painful and humiliating object, unless it be, indeed, that which we have to feel where men, without renewal of heart, espouse in pride of mind the truth with nothing but unrighteousness.

In the beginning ofRomans 2:1-29; Romans 2:1-29 we have man pretending to righteousness. Still, it is "man" not yet exactly the Jew, but man who had profited, it might be, by whatever the Jew had; at the least, by the workings of natural conscience. But natural conscience, although it may detect evil, never leads one into the inward possession and enjoyment of good never brings the soul to God. Accordingly, in chapter 2 the Holy Spirit shows us man satisfying himself with pronouncing on what is right and wrong moralizing for others, but nothing more. Now God must have reality in the man himself. The gospel, instead of treating this as a light matter, alone vindicates God in these eternal ways of His, in that which must be in him who stands in relationship with God. Hence therefore, the apostle, with divine wisdom, opens this to us before the blessed relief and deliverance which the gospel reveals to us. In the most solemn way he appeals to man with the demand, whether he thinks that God will look complacently on that which barely judges another, but which allows the practice of evil in the man himself (Romans 2:1-3). Such moral judgments will, no doubt, be used to leave man without excuse; they can never suit or satisfy God.

Then the apostle introduces the ground, certainty, and character of God's judgment (verses 4-16). He "will render to every man according to his deeds: to them who by patient continuance in well doing seek for glory and honour and immortality, eternal life: to them that are contentious, and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish, upon every soul of man that doeth evil, of the Jew first and also of the Gentile."

It is not here a question of how a man is to be saved, but of God's indispensable moral judgment, which the gospel, instead of weakening asserts according to the holiness and truth of God. It will be observed therefore, that in this connection the apostle shows the place both of conscience and of the law, that God in judging will take into full consideration the circumstances and condition of every soul of man. At the same time he connects, in a singularly interesting manner, this disclosure of the principles of the eternal judgment of God with what he calls "my gospel." This also is a most important truth, my brethren, to bear in mind. The gospel at its height in no wise weakens but maintains the moral manifestation of what God is. The legal institutions were associated with temporal judgment. The gospel, as now revealed in the New Testament, has linked with it, though not contained in it, the revelation of divine wrath from heaven, and this, you will observe, according to Paul's gospel. It is evident, therefore, that dispensational position will not suffice for God, who holds to His own unchangeable estimate of good and evil, and who judges the more stringently according to the measure of advantage possessed.

But thus the way is now clear for bringing the Jew into the discussion. "But if [for so it should be read] thou art named a Jew," etc. (ver. 17.) It was not merely, that he had better light. He had this, of course, in a revelation that was from God; he had law; he had prophets; he had divine institutions. It was not merely better light in the conscience, which might be elsewhere, as is supposed in the early verses of our chapter; but the Jew's position was directly and unquestionably one of divine tests applied to man's estate. Alas! the Jew was none the better for this, unless there were the submission of his conscience to God. Increase of privileges can never avail without the soul's self-judgment before the mercy of God. Rather does it add to his guilt: such is man's evil state and will. Accordingly, in the end of the chapter, he shows that this is most true as applied to the moral judgment of the Jew; that uone so much dishonoured God as wicked Jews, their own Scripture attesting it; that position went for nothing in such, while the lack of it would not annul the Gentile's righteousness, which would indeed condemn the more unfaithful Israel; in short, that one must be a Jew inwardly to avail, and circumcision be of the heart, in spirit, not in letter, whose praise is of God, and not of men.

The question then is raised in the beginning ofRomans 3:1-31; Romans 3:1-31, If this be so, what is the superiority of the Jew? Where lies the value of belonging to the circumcised people of God? The apostle allows this privilege to be great, specially in having the Scriptures, but turns the argument against the boasters. We need not here enter into the details; but on the surface we see how the apostle brings all down to that which is of the deepest interest to every soul. He deals with the Jew from his own Scripture (verses 9-19). Did the Jews take the ground of exclusively having that word of God the law? Granted that it is so, at once and fully. To whom, then, did the law address itself? To those that were under it, to be sure. It pronounced on the Jew then. It was the boast of the Jews that the law spoke about them; that the Gentiles had no right to it, and were but presuming on what belonged to God's chosen people. The apostle applies this according to divine wisdom. Then your principle is your condemnation. What the law says, it speaks to those under it. What, then, is its voice? That there is none righteous, none that doeth good, none that understandeth. Of whom does it declare all this? Of the Jew by his own confession. Every mouth was stopped; the Jew by his own oracles, as the Gentile by their evident abominations, shown already. All the world was guilty before God.

Thus, having shown the Gentile in Romans 1:1-32 manifestly wrong, and hopelessly degraded to the last degree having laid bare the moral dilettantism of the philosophers, not one whit better in the sight of God, but rather the reverse having shown the Jew overwhelmed by the condemnation of the divine oracles in which he chiefly boasted, without real righteousness, and so much the more guilty for his special privileges, all now lies clear for bringing in the proper Christian message, the. gospel of God. "Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets" (verses 20, 21).

Here, again, the apostle takes up what he had but announced in chapter 1 the righteousness of God. Let me call your attention again to its force. It is not the mercy of God., Many have contended that so it is, and to their own great loss, as well as to the weakening of the word of God. "Righteousness" never means mercy, not even the "righteousness of God." The meaning is not what was executed on Christ, but what is in virtue. of it. Undoubtedly divine judgment fell on Him; but this is not "the righteousness of God," as the apostle employs it in any part of his writings any more than here, though we know there could be no such thing as God's righteousness justifying the believer, if Christ had not borne the judgment of God. The expression means that righteousness which God can afford to display because of Christ's atonement. In short, it is what the words say "the righteousness of God," and this "by faith of Jesus Christ."

Hence it is wholly apart from the law, whilst witnessed to by the law and prophets; for the law with its types had looked onward to this new kind of righteousness; and the prophets had borne their testimony that it was at hand, but not then come. Now it was manifested, and not promised or predicted merely. Jesus had come and died; Jesus had been a propitiatory sacrifice; Jesus had borne the judgment of God because of the sins He bore. The righteousness of God, then, could now go forth in virtue of His blood. God was not satisfied alone. There is satisfaction; but the work of Christ goes a great deal farther. Therein God is both vindicated and glorified. By the cross God has a deeper moral glory than ever a glory that He thus acquired, if I may so say. He is, of course, the same absolutely perfect and unchangeable God of goodness; but His perfection has displayed itself in new and more glorious ways in Christ's death, in Him who humbled Himself, and was obedient even to the death of the cross.

God, therefore, having not the least hindrance to the manifestation of what He can be and is in merciful intervention on behalf of the worst of sinners, manifests it is His righteousness "by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe" (ver. 22). The former is the direction, and the latter the application. The direction is "unto all;" the application is, of course, only to "them that believe;" but it is to all them that believe. As far as persons are concerned, there is no hindrance; Jew or Gentile makes no difference, as is expressly said, "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the [passing over or praeter-mission, not] remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus" (verses 23-26). There is no simple mind that can evade the plain force of this last expression. The righteousness of God means that God is just, while at the same time He justifies the believer in Christ Jesus. It is His righteousness, or, in other words, His perfect consistency with Himself, which is always involved in the notion of righteousness. He is consistent with Himself when He is justifying sinners, or, more strictly, all those who believe in Jesus. He can meet the sinner, but He justifies the believer; and in this, instead of trenching on His glory, there is a deeper revelation and maintenance of it than if there never had been sin or a sinner.

Horribly offensive as sin is to God, and inexcusable in the creature, it is sin which has given occasion to the astonishing display of divine righteousness in justifying believers. It is not a question of His mercy merely; for this weakens the truth immensely, and perverts its character wholly. The righteousness of God flows from His mercy, of course; but its character and basis is righteousness. Christ's work of redemption deserves that God should act as He does in the gospel. Observe again, it is not victory here; for that would give place to human pride. It is not a soul's overcoming its difficulties, but a sinner's submission to the righteousness of God. It is God Himself who, infinitely glorified in the Lord that expiated our sins by His one sacrifice, remits them now, not looking for our victory, nor as yet even in leading us on to victory, but by faith in Jesus and His blood. God is proved thus divinely consistent with Himself in Christ Jesus, whom He has set forth a mercy-seat through faith in His blood.

Accordingly the apostle says that boast and works are completely set aside by this principle which affirms faith, apart from deeds of law, to be the means of relationship with God (verses 27, 28). Consequently the door is as open to the Gentile as to the Jew. The ground taken by a Jew for supposing God exclusively for Israel was, that they had the law, which was the measure of what God claimed from man; and this the Gentile had not. But such thoughts altogether vanish now, because, as the Gentile was unquestionably wicked and abominable, so from the law's express denunciation the Jew was universally guilty before God. Consequently all turned, not on what man should be for God, but what God can be and is, as revealed in the gospel, to man. This maintains both the glory and the moral universality of Him who will justify the circumcision by faith, not law, and the uncircumcision through their faith, if they believe the gospel. Nor does this in the slightest degree weaken the principle of law. On the contrary, the doctrine of faith establishes law as nothing else can; and for this simple reason, that if one who is guilty hopes to be saved spite of the broken law, it must be at the expense of the law that condemns his guilt; whereas the gospel shows no sparing of sin, but the most complete condemnation of it all, as charged on Him who shed His blood in atonement. The doctrine of faith therefore, which reposes on the cross, establishes law, instead of making it void, as every other principle must (verses 27-31).

But this is not the full extent of salvation. Accordingly we do not hear of salvation as such in Romans 3:1-31. There is laid down the most essential of all truths as a groundwork of salvation; namely, expiation. There is the vindication of God in His ways with the Old Testament believers. Their sins had been passed by. He could not have remitted heretofore. This would not have been just. And the blessedness of the gospel is, that it is (not merely an exercise of mercy, but also) divinely just. It would not have been righteous in any sense to have remitted the sins, until they were actually borne by One who could and did suffer for them. But now they were; and thus God vindicated Himself perfectly as to the past. But this great work of Christ was not and could not be a mere vindication of God; and we may find it otherwise developed in various parts of Scripture, which I here mention by the way to show the point at which we are arrived. God's righteousness was now manifested as to the past sins He had not brought into judgment through His forbearance, and yet more conspicuously in the present time, when He displayed His justice in justifying the believer.

But this is not all; and the objection of the Jew gives occasion for the apostle to bring out a fuller display of what God is. Did they fall back on Abraham? "What shall we then say that Abraham our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? For if Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof to glory; but not before God." Did the Jew fancy that the gospel makes very light of Abraham, and of the then dealings of God? Not so, says the apostle. Abraham is the proof of the value of faith in justification before God. Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. There was no law there or then; for Abraham died long before God spoke from Sinai. He believed God and His word, with special approval on God's part; and his faith was counted as righteousness (ver. 3). And this was powerfully corroborated by the testimony of another great name in Israel (David), in Psalms 32:1-11. "For day and night thy hand was heavy upon me: my moisture is turned into the drought of summer. I acknowledged my sin unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid. I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. For this shall every one that is godly pray unto thee in a time when thou mayest be found: surely in the floods of great waters they shall not come nigh unto him. Thou art my hiding-place; thou shalt preserve me from trouble; thou shalt compass me about with songs of deliverance. I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye."

In the same way the apostle disposes of all pretence on the score of ordinances, especially circumcision. Not only was Abraham justified without law, but apart from that great sign of mortification of the flesh. Although circumcision began with Abraham, manifestly it had nothing to do with his righteousness, and at best was but the seal of the righteousness of faith which he had in an uncircumcised state. It could not therefore be the source or means of his righteousness. All then that believe, though uncircumcised, might claim him as father, assured that righteousness will be reckoned to them too. And he is father of circumcision in the best sense, not to Jews, but to believing Gentiles. Thus the discussion of Abraham strengthens the case in behalf of the uncircumcised who believe, to the overthrow of the greatest boast of the Jew. The appeal to their own inspired account of Abraham turned into a proof of the consistency of God's ways in justifying by faith, and hence in justifying the uncircumcised no less than the circumcision.

But there is more than this in Romans 4:1-25 He takes up a third feature of Abraham's case; that is, the connection of the promise with resurrection. Here it is not merely the negation of law and of circumcision, but we have the positive side. Law works wrath because it provokes transgression; grace makes the promise sure to all the seed, not only because faith is open to the Gentile and Jew alike, but because God is looked to as a quickener of the dead. What gives glory to God like this? Abraham believed God when, according to nature, it was impossible for him or for Sarah to have a child. The quickening power of God therefore was here set forth, of course historically in a way connected with this life and a posterity on earth, but nevertheless a very just and true sign of God's power for the believer the quickening energy of God after a still more blessed sort. And this leads us to see not only where there was an analogy with those who believe in a promised Saviour, but also to a weighty difference. And this lies in the fact that Abraham believed God before he had the son, being fully persuaded that what He had promised He was able to perform. and therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. But we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. It is done. already. It is not here believing on Jesus, but on God who has proved what He is to us in raisin, from among the dead Him who was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification (verses 13-25).

This brings out a most emphatic truth and special side of Christianity. Christianity is not a system of promise, but rather of promise accomplished in Christ. Hence it is essentially founded on the gift not only of a Saviour who would interpose, in the mercy of God, to bear our sins, but of One who is already revealed, and the work done and accepted, and this known in the fact that God Himself has interposed to raise Him from among the dead a bright and momentous thing to press on souls, as indeed we find the apostles insisting on it throughout the Acts. Were it merely Romans 3:1-31 there could not be full peace with God as there is. One might know a most real clinging to Jesus; but this would not set the heart at ease with God. The soul may feel the blood of Jesus to be a yet deeper want; but this alone does not give peace with God. In such a condition what has been found in Jesus is too often misused to make a kind of difference, so to speak, between the Saviour on the one hand, and God on the other ruinous always to the enjoyment of the full blessing of the gospel. Now there is no way in which God could lay a basis for peace with Himself more blessed than as He has done it. No longer does the question exist of requiring an expiation. That is the first necessity for the sinner with God. But we have had it fully in Romans 3:1-31. Now it is the positive power of God in raising up from the dead Him that was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justifying. The whole work is done.

The soul therefore now is represented for the first time as already justified and in possession of peace with God. This is a state of mind, and not the necessary or immediate fruit of Romans 3:1-31, but is based on the truth of Romans 4:1-25 as well as 3. There never can be solid peace with God without both. A soul may as truly, no doubt, be put into relationship with God be made very happy, it may be; but it is not what Scripture calls "peace with God." Therefore it is here for the first time that we find salvation spoken of in the grand results that are now brought before us in Romans 5:1-11. "Being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." There is entrance into favour, and nothing but favour. The believer is not put under law, you will observe, but under grace, which is the precise reverse of law. The soul is brought into peace with God, as it finds its standing in the grace of God, and, more than that, rejoices in hope of the glory of God. Such is the doctrine and the fact. It is not merely a call then; but as we have by our Lord Jesus Christ our access into the favour wherein we stand, so there is positive boasting in the hope of the glory of God. For it may have been noticed from chapter 3 to chapter 5, that nothing but fitness for the glory of God will do now. It is not a question of creature-standing. This passed away with man when he sinned. Now that God has revealed Himself in the gospel, it is not what will suit man on earth, but what is worthy of the presence of the glory of God. Nevertheless the apostle does not expressly mention heaven here. This was not suitable to the character of the epistle; but the glory of God he does. We all know where it is and must be for the Christian.

The consequences are thus pursued; first, the general place of the believer now, in all respects, in relation to the past, the present, and the future. His pathway follows; and he shows that the very troubles of the road become a distinct matter of boast. This was not a direct and intrinsic effect, of course, but the result of spiritual dealing for the soul. It was the Lord giving us the profit of sorrow, and ourselves bowing to the way and end of God in it, so that the result of tribulation should be rich and fruitful experience.

Then there is another and crowning part of the blessing: "And not only so, but also boasting in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the reconciliation." It is not only a blessing in its own direct character, or in indirect though real effects, but the Giver Himself is our joy, and boast, and glory. The consequences spiritually are blessed to the soul; how much more is it to Teach the source from which all flows! This, accordingly, is the essential spring of worship. The fruits of it are not expanded here; but, in point of fact, to joy in God is necessarily that which makes praise and adoration to be the simple and spontaneous exercise of the heart. In heaven it will fill us perfectly; but there is no more perfect joy there, nor anything. higher, if so high, in this epistle.

At this point we enter upon a most important part of the epistle, on which we must dwell for a little. It is no longer a question of man's guilt, but of his nature. Hence the apostle does not, as in the early chapters of this epistle, take up our sins, except as proofs and symptoms of sin. Accordingly, for the first time, the Spirit of God fromRomans 5:12; Romans 5:12 traces the mature of man to the head of the race. This brings in the contrast with the other Head, the Lord Jesus Christ, whom we have here not as One bearing our sins in His own body on the tree, but as the spring and chief of a new family. Hence, as is shown later in the chapter, Adam is a head characterized by disobedience, who brought in death, the just penalty of sin; as on the other hand we have Him of whom he was the type, Christ, the obedient man, who has brought in righteousness, and this after a singularly blessed sort and style "justification of life." Of it nothing has been heard till now. We have had justification, both by blood and also in virtue of Christ's resurrection. But "justification of life" goes farther, though involved in the latter, than the end of Romans 4:1-25; for now we learn that in the gospel there is not only a dealing with the guilt of those that are addressed in it; there is also a mighty work of God in the presenting the man in a new place before God, and in fact, too, for his faith, clearing him from all the consequences in which he finds himself as a man in the flesh here below.

It is here that you will find a great failure of Christendom as to this. Not that any part of the truth has escaped: it is the fatal brand of that "great house" that even the most elementary truth suffers the deepest injury; but as to this truth, it seems unknown altogether. I hope that brethren in Christ will bear with me if I press on them the importance of taking good heed to it that their souls are thoroughly grounded in this, the proper place of the Christian by Christ's death and resurrection. It must not be, assumed too readily. There is a disposition continually to imagine that what is frequently spoken of must be understood; but experience will soon show that this is not the case. Even those that seek a place of separation to the Lord outside that which is now hurrying on souls to destruction are, nevertheless, deeply affected by the condition of that Christendom in which we find ourselves.

Here, then, it is not a question at all of pardon or remission. First of all the apostle points out that death has come in, and that this was no consequence of law, but before it. Sin was in the world between Adam and Moses, when the law was not. This clearly takes in man, it will be observed; and this is his grand point now. The contrast of Christ with Adam takes in man universally as well as the Christian; and man in sin, alas! was true, accordingly, before the law, right through the law, and ever since the law. The apostle is therefore plainly in presence of the broadest possible grounds of comparison, though we shall find more too.

But the Jew might argue that it was an unjust thing in principle this gospel, these tidings of which the apostle was so full; for why should one man affect many, yea, all? "Not so," replies the apostle. Why should this be so strange and incredible to you? for on your own showing, according to that word to which we all bow, you must admit that one man's sin brought in universal moral ruin and death. Proud as you may be of that which distinguishes you, it is hard to make sin and death peculiar to you, nor can you connect them even with the law particularly: the race of man is in question, and not Israel alone. There is nothing that proves this so convincingly as the book of Genesis; and the apostle, by the Spirit of God, calmly but triumphantly summons the Jewish Scriptures to demonstrate that which the Jews were so strenuously denying. Their own Scriptures maintained, as nothing else could, that all the wretchedness which is now found in the world, and the condemnation which hangs over the race, is the fruit of one man, and indeed of one act.

Now, if it was righteous in God (and who will gainsay it?) to deal with the whole posterity of Adam as involved in death because of one, their common father, who could deny the consistency of one man's saving? who would defraud God of that which He delights in the blessedness of bringing in deliverance by that One man, of whom Adam was the image? Accordingly, then, he confronts the unquestionable truth, admitted by every Israelite, of the universal havoc by one man everywhere with the One man who has brought in (not pardon only, but, as we shall find) eternal life and liberty liberty now in the free gift of life, but a liberty that will never cease for the soul's enjoyment until it has embraced the very body that still groans, and this because of the Holy Ghost who dwells in it.

Here, then, it is a comparison of the two great heads Adam and Christ, and the immeasurable superiority of the second man is shown. That is, it is not merely pardon of past sins, but deliverance from sin, and in due time from all its consequences. The apostle has come now to the nature. This is the essential point. It is the thing which troubles a renewed conscientious soul above all, because of his surprise at finding the deep evil of the flesh and its mind after having proved the great grace of God in the gift of Christ. If I am thus pitied of God, if so truly and completely a justified man, if I am really an object of God's eternal favour, how can I have such a sense of continual evil? why am I still under bondage and misery from the constant evil of my nature, over which I seem to have no power whatever? Has God then no delivering power from this? The answer is found in this portion of our epistle (that is, from the middle of chapter 5).

Having shown first, then, the sources and the character of the blessing in general as far as regards deliverance, the apostle sums up the result in the end of the chapter: "That as sin hath reigned in death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life," the point being justification of life now through Jesus Christ our Lord.

This is applied in the two chapters that follow. There are two things that might make insuperable difficulty: the one is the obstacle of sin in the nature to practical holiness; the other is the provocation and condemnation of the law. Now the doctrine which we saw asserted in the latter part ofRomans 5:1-21; Romans 5:1-21 is applied to both. First, as to practical holiness, it is not merely that Christ has died for my sins, but that even in the initiatory act of baptism the truth set forth there is that I am dead. It is not, as in Ephesians 2:1-22, dead in sins, which would be nothing to the purpose. This is all perfectly true true of a Jew as of a pagan true of any unrenewed man that never heard of a Saviour. But what is testified by Christian baptism is Christ's death. "Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized unto Jesus Christ were baptized unto his death?" Thereby is identification with His death. "Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death; that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life." The man who, being baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, or Christian baptism, would assert any license to sin because it is in his nature, as if it were therefore an inevitable necessity, denies the real and evident meaning of his baptism. That act denoted not even the washing away of our sins by the blood of Jesus, which would not apply to the case, nor in any adequate way meet the question of nature. What baptism sets forth is more than that, and is justly found, not in Romans 3:1-31, but inRomans 6:1-23; Romans 6:1-23. There is no inconsistency in Ananias's word to the apostle Paul "wash away thy sins, calling upon the name of the Lord." There is water as well as blood, and to that, not to this, the washing here refers. But there is more, which Paul afterwards insisted on. That was said to Paul, rather than what was taught by Paul. What the apostle had given him in fulness was the great truth, however fundamental it may be, that I am entitled, and even called on in the name of the Lord Jesus, to know that I am dead to sin; not that I must die, but that I am dead that my baptism means nothing less than this, and is shorn of its most emphatic point if limited merely to Christ's dying for my sins. It is not so alone; but in His death, unto which I am baptized, I am dead to sin. And "how shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?" Hence, then, we find that the whole chapter is founded on this truth. "Shall we sin," says he, proceeding yet farther (ver. 15), "because we are not under the law, but under grace?" This were indeed to deny the value of His death, and of that newness of life we have in Him risen, and a return to bondage of the worst description.

In Romans 7:1-25 we have the subject of the law discussed for practice as well as in principle, and there again meet with the same weapon of tried and unfailing temper. It is no longer blood, but death Christ's death and resurrection. The figure of the relationship of husband and wife is introduced in order to make the matter plain. Death, and nothing short of it, rightly dissolves the bond. We accordingly are dead, says he, to the law; not (as no doubt almost all of us know) that the law dies, but that we are dead to the law in the death of Christ. Compare verse 6 (where the margin, not the text, is substantially correct) with verse 4. Such is the principle. The rest of the chapter (7-25) is an instructive episode, in which the impotence and the misery of the renewed mind which attempts practice under law are fully argued out, till deliverance (not pardon) is found in Christ.

Thus the latter portion of the chapter is not doctrine exactly, but the proof of the difficulties of a soul who has not realised death to the law by the body of Christ. Did this seem to treat the law that condemned as an evil thing? Not so, says the apostle; it is because of the evil of the nature, not of the law. The law never delivers; it condemns and kills us. It was meant to make sin exceeding sinful. Hence, what he is here discussing is not remission of sins, but deliverance from sin. No wonder, if souls confound the two things together, that they never know deliverance in practice. Conscious deliverance, to be solid according to God, must be in the line of His truth. In vain will you preach Romans 3:1-31, or even 4 alone, for souls to know themselves consciously and holily set free.

From verse 14 there is an advance. There we find Christian knowledge as to the matter introduced; but still it is the knowledge of one who is not in this state pronouncing on one who is. You must carefully guard against the notion of its being a question of Paul's own experience, because he says, "I had not known," "I was alive," etc. There is no good reason for such an assumption, but much against it. It might be more or less any man's lot to learn. It is not meant that Paul knew nothing of this; but that the ground of inference, and the general theory built up, are alike mistaken. We have Paul informing us that he transfers sometimes in a figure to himself that which was in no wise necessarily his own experience, and perhaps had not been so at any time. But this may be comparatively a light question. The great point is to note the true picture given us of a soul quickened, but labouring and miserable under law, not at all consciously delivered. The last verses of the chapter, however, bring in the deliverance not yet the fulness of it, but the hinge, so to speak. The discovery is made that the source of the internal misery was that the mind, though renewed, was occupied with the law as a means of dealing with, flesh. Hence the very fact of being renewed makes one sensible of a far more intense misery than ever, while there is no power until the soul looks right outside self to Him who is dead and risen, who has anticipated the difficulty, and alone gives the full answer to all wants.

Romans 8:1-39 displays this comforting truth in its fulness. From the first verse we have the application of the dead and risen Christ to the soul, till in verse 11 we see the power of the Holy Ghost, which brings the soul into this liberty now, applied by-and-by to the body, when there will be the complete deliverance. "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh." A wondrous way, but most blessed! And there (for such was the point) it was the complete condemnation of this evil thing, the nature in its present state, so as, nevertheless, to set the believer as before God's judgment free from itself as well as its consequences. This God has wrought in Christ. It is not in any degree settled as to itself by His blood. The shedding of His blood was absolutely necessary: without that precious expiation all else had been vain and impossible. But there is much more in Christ than that to which too many souls restrict themselves, not less to their own loss than to His dishonour. God has condemned the flesh. And here it may be repeated that it is no question of pardoning the sinner, but of condemning the fallen nature; and this so as to give the soul both power and a righteous immunity from all internal anguish about it. For the truth is that God has in Christ condemned sin, and this for sin definitely; so that He has nothing more to do in condemnation of that root of evil. What a title, then, God gives me now in beholding Christ, no longer dead but risen, to have it settled before my soul that I am in Him as He now is, where all questions are closed in peace and joy! For what remains unsolved by and in Christ? Once it was far otherwise. Before the cross there hung out the gravest question that ever was raised, and it needed settlement in this world; but in Christ sin is for ever abolished for the believer; and this not only in respect of what He has done, but in what He is. Till the cross, well might a converted soul be found groaning in misery at each fresh discovery of evil in himself. But now to faith all this is gone not lightly, but truly in the sight of God; so that he may live on a Saviour that is risen from the dead as his new life.

Accordingly Romans 8:1-39 pursues in the most practical manner the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. First of all, the groundwork of it is laid in the first four verses, the last of them leading into every-day walk. And it is well for those ignorant of it to know that here, in verse 4, the apostle speaks first of "walking not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." The latter clause in the first verse of the authorised version mars the sense. In the fourth verse this could not be absent; in the first verse it ought not to be present. Thus the deliverance is not merely for the joy of the soul, but also for strength in our walking after the Spirit, who has given and found a nature in which He delights, communicating withal His own delight in Christ, and making obedience to be the joyful service of the believer. The believer, therefore, unwittingly though really, dishonours the Saviour, if he be content to walk short of this standard and power; he is entitled and called to walk according to his place, and in the confidence of his deliverance in Christ Jesus before God.

Then the domains of flesh and Spirit are brought before us: the one characterized by sin and death practically now; the other by life, righteousness, and peace, which is, as we saw, to be crowned finally by the resurrection of these bodies of ours. The Holy Ghost, who now gives the soul its consciousness of deliverance from its place in Christ, is also the witness that the body too, the mortal body, shall be delivered in its time. "If the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by [or because of] his Spirit that dwelleth in you."

Next, he enters upon another branch of the truth the Spirit not as a condition contrasted with flesh (these two, as we know, being always contrasted in Scripture), but as a power, a divine person that dwells in and bears His witness to the believer. His witness to our spirit is this, that we are children of God. But if children, we are His heirs. This accordingly leads, as connected with the deliverance of the body, to the inheritance we are to possess. The extent is what God Himself, so to speak, possesses the universe of God, whatever will be under Christ: and what will not? As He has made all, so He is heir of all. We are heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.

Hence the action of the Spirit of God in a double point of view comes before us. As He is the spring of our joy, He is the power of sympathy in our sorrows, and the believer knows both. The faith of Christ has brought divine joy into his soul; but, in point of fact, he is traversing a world of infirmity, suffering, and grief. Wonderful to think the Spirit of God associates Himself with us in it all, deigning to give us divine feelings even in our poor and narrow hearts. This occupies the central part of the chapter, which then closes with the unfailing and faithful power of God for us in all our experiences here below. As He has given us through the blood of Jesus full remission, as we shall be saved by this life, as He has made us know even now nothing short of present conscious deliverance from every whit of evil that belongs to our very nature, as we have the Spirit the earnest of the glory to which we are destined, as we are the vessels of gracious sorrow in the midst of that from which we are not yet delivered but shall be, so now we have the certainty that, whatever betide, God is for us, and that nothing shall separate us from His love which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Then, in Romans 9:1-33; Romans 10:1-21; Romans 11:1-36, the apostle handles a difficulty serious to any mind, especially to the Jew, who might readily feel that all this display of grace in Christ to the Gentile as much as to the Jew by the gospel seems to make very cheap the distinctive place of Israel as given of God. If the good news of God goes out to man, entirely blotting out the difference between a Jew and a Gentile, what becomes of His special promises to Abraham and to his seed? What about His word passed and sworn to the fathers? The apostle shows them with astonishing force at the starting-point that he was far from slighting their privileges. He lays down such a summary as no Jew ever gave since they were a nation. He brings out the peculiar glories of Israel according to the depth of the gospel as he knew and preached it; at least, of His person who is the object of faith now revealed. Far from denying or obscuring what they boasted of, he goes beyond them "Who are Israelites," says he, "to whom pertaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises; whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all God blessed for ever." Here was the very truth that every Jew, as such, denied. What blindness! Their crowning glory was precisely what they would not hear of. What glory so rich as that of the Christ Himself duly appreciated? He was God over all blessed for ever, as well as their Messiah. Him who came in humiliation, according to their prophets, they might despise; but it was vain to deny that the same prophets bore witness to His divine glory. He was Emmanuel, yea, the Jehovah, God of Israel. Thus then, if Paul gave his own sense of Jewish privileges, there was no unbelieving Jew that rose up to his estimate of them.

But now, to meet the question that was raised, they pleaded the distinguishing promises to Israel. Upon what ground? Because they were sons of Abraham. But how, argues he, could this stand, seeing that Abraham had another son, just as much his child as Isaac? What did they say to Ishmaelites as joint-heirs? They would not hear of it. No, they cry, it is in Isaac's seed that the Jew was called. Yes, but this is another principle. If in Isaac only, it is a question of the seed, not that was born, but that was called. Consequently the call of God, and not the birth simply makes the real difference. Did they venture to plead that it must be not only the same father, but the same mother? The answer is, that this will not do one whit better; for when we come down to the next generation, it is apparent that the two sons of Isaac were sons of the same mother; nay, they were twins. What could be conceived closer or more even than this? Surely if equal birth-tie could ensure community of blessing if a charter from God depended on being sprung from the same father and mother, there was no case so strong, no claim so evident, as that of Esau to take the same rights as Jacob. Why would they not allow such a pretension? Was it not sure and evident that Israel could not take the promise on the ground of mere connection after the flesh? Birthright from the same father would let in Ishmael on the one hand, as from both parents it would secure the title of Esau on the other. Clearly, then, such ground is untenable. In point of fact, as he had hinted before, their true tenure was the call of God, who was free, if He pleased, to bring in other people. It became simply a question whether, in fact, God did call Gentiles, or whether He had revealed such intentions.

But he meets their proud exclusiveness in another way. He shows that, on the responsible ground of being His nation, they were wholly ruined. If the first book in the Bible showed that it was only the call of God that made Israel what they were, its second book as clearly proved that all was over with the called people, had it not been for the mercy of God. They set up the golden calf, and thus cast off the true God, their God, even in the desert. Did the call of God. then, go out to Gentiles? Has He mercy only for guilty Israel? Is there no call, no mercy, of God for any besides?

Hereupon he enters upon the direct proofs, and first cites Hosea as a witness. That early prophet tells Israel, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God. Jezreel, Lo-ruhamah, and Lo-ammi were of awful import for Israel; but, in presence of circumstances so disastrous, there should be not merely a people but sons of the living God, and then should Judah and Israel be gathered as one people under one head. The application of this was more evident to the Gentile than to the Jew. Compare Peter's use in1 Peter 2:10; 1 Peter 2:10. Finally he brings in Isaiah, showing that, far from retaining their blessing as an unbroken people, a remnant alone would be saved. Thus one could not fail to see these two weighty inferences: the bringing in to be God's sons of those that had not been His people, and the judgment and destruction of the great mass of His undoubted people. Of these only a remnant would be saved. On both sides therefore the apostle is meeting the grand points he had at heart to demonstrate from their own Scriptures.

For all this, as he presses further, there was the weightiest reason possible. God is gracious, but holy; He is faithful, but righteous. The apostle refers to Isaiah to show that God would "lay in Zion a stumbling-stone." It is in Zion that He lays it. It is not among the Gentiles, but in the honoured centre of the polity of Israel. There would be found a stumblingstone there. What was to be the stumbling-stone? Of course, it could hardly be the law: that was the boast of Israel. What was it? There could be but one satisfactory answer. The stumbling-stone was their despised and rejected Messiah. This was the key to their difficulties this alone, and fully explains their coming ruin as well as God's solemn warnings.

In the next chapter (Romans 10:1-21) he carries on the subject, showing in the most touching manner his affection for the people. He at the same time unfolds the essential difference between the righteousness of faith and that of law. He takes their own books, and proves from one of them (Deuteronomy) that in the ruin of Israel the resource is not going into the depths, nor going up to heaven. Christ indeed did both; and so the word was nigh them, in their mouth and in their heart. It is not doing, but believing; therefore it is what is proclaimed to them, and what they receive and believe. Along with this he gathers testimonies from more than one prophet. He quotes from Joel, that whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. He quotes also from Isaiah "Whosoever believeth on Him shall not be ashamed." And mark the force of it whosoever." The believer, whosoever he might be, should not be ashamed. Was it possible to limit this to Israel? But more than this "Whosoever shall call." There. is the double prophecy. Whosoever believed should not be ashamed; whosoever called should be saved. In both parts, as it may be observed, the door is opened to the Gentile.

But then again he intimates that the nature of the gospel is involved in the publishing of the glad tidings. It is not God having an earthly centre, and the peoples doming up to worship the Lord in Jerusalem. It is the going forth of His richest blessing. And where? How far? To the limits of the holy land? Far beyond. Psalms 19:1-14 is used in the most beautiful manner to insinuate that the limits are the world. Just as the sun in the heavens is not for one people or land alone, no more is the gospel. There is no language where their voice is not heard. "Yea verily, their sound went forth into all the earth, and their words unto the ends of the world." The gospel goes forth universally. Jewish pretensions were therefore disposed of; not here by new and fuller revelations, but by this divinely skilful employment of their own Old Testament Scriptures.

Finally he comes to two other witnesses; as from the Psalms, so now from the law and the prophets. The first is Moses himself. Moses saith, "I will provoke you to jealousy by them that are no people," etc. How could the Jews say that this meant themselves? On the contrary, it was the Jew provoked by the Gentiles "By them that are no people, and by a foolish nation I will anger you." Did they deny that they were a foolish nation? Be it so then; it was a foolish nation by which Moses declared they should be angered. But this does not content the apostle, or rather the Spirit of God; for he goes on to point out that Isaiah "is very bold" in a similar way; that is, there is no concealing the truth of the matter. Isaiah says: "I was found of them who sought me not; I was made manifest unto them that asked not after me." The Jews were the last in the world to take such ground as this. It was undeniable that the Gentiles did not seek the Lord, nor ask after Him; and the prophet says that Jehovah was found of them that sought Him not, and was made manifest to them that asked not after Him. Nor is there only the manifest call of the Gentiles in this, but with no less clearness there is the rejection, at any rate for a time, of proud Israel. "But unto Israel he saith, All day long have I stretched out my hands unto a disobedient and gainsaying people."

Thus the proof was complete. The Gentiles the despised heathen were to be brought in; the self-satisfied Jews are left behind, justly and beyond question, if they believed the law and the prophets.

But did this satisfy the apostle? It was undoubtedly enough for present purposes. The past history of Israel was sketched inRomans 9:1-33; Romans 9:1-33; the present more immediately is before us inRomans 10:1-21; Romans 10:1-21. The future must be brought in by the grace of God; and this he accordingly gives us at the close of Romans 11:1-36. First, he raises the question, "Has God cast away his people?" Let it not be! Was he not himself, says Paul, a proof to the contrary? Then he enlarges, and points out that there is a remnant of grace in the worst of times. If God had absolutely cast away His people, would there be such mercy? There would be no remnant if justice took its course. The remnant proves, then, that even under judgment the rejection of Israel is not complete, but rather a pledge of future favour. This is the first ground.

The second plea is not that the rejection of Israel is only partial, however extensive, but that it is also temporary, and not definitive. This is to fall back on a principle he had already used. God was rather provoking Israel to jealousy by the call of the Gentiles. But if it were so, He had not done with them. Thus the first argument shows that the rejection was not total; the second, that it was but for a season.

But there is a third. Following up with the teaching of the olive-tree, he carries out the same thought of a remnant that abides on their own stock, and points to a re-instatement of the nation, And I would just observe by the way, that the Gentile cry that no Jew ever accepts the gospel in truth is a falsehood. Israel is indeed the only people of whom there is always a portion that believe. Time was when none of the English, nor French, nor of any other nation believed in the Saviour. There never was an hour since Israel's existence as a nation that God has not had His remnant of them. Such has been their singular fruit of promise; such even in the midst of all their misery it is at present. And as that little remnant is ever sustained by the grace of God, it is the standing pledge of their final blessedness through His mercy, whereon the apostle breaks out into raptures of thanksgiving to God. The day hastens when the Redeemer shall come to Zion. He shall come, says one Testament, out of Zion. He shall come to Zion, says the other. In both Old and New it is the same substantial testimony. Thither He shall come, and thence, go forth. He shall own that once glorious seat of royalty in Israel. Zion shall yet behold her mighty, divine, but once despised Deliverer; and when He thus comes, there will be a deliverance suited to His glory. All Israel shall be saved. God, therefore, had not cast off His people, but was employing the interval of their slip from their place, in consequence of their rejection of Christ, to call the Gentiles in sovereign mercy, after which Israel as a whole should be saved. "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor? or who hath first liven to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever."

The rest of the epistle takes up the practical consequences of the great doctrine of God's righteousness, which had been now shown to be supported by, and in no wise inconsistent with, His promises to Israel. The whole history of Israel, past, present, and future falls in with, although quite distinct from, that which he had been expounding. Here I shall be very brief.

Romans 12:1-21 looks at the mutual duties of the saints. Romans 13:1-14; Romans 13:1-14 urges their duties towards what was outside them, more particularly to the powers that be, but also to men in general. Love is the great debt that we owe, which never can be paid, but which we should always be paying. The chapter closes with the day of the Lord in its practical force on the Christian walk. In Romans 14:1-23 and the beginning ofRomans 15:1-33; Romans 15:1-33 we have the delicate theme of Christian forbearance in its limits and largeness. The weak are not to judge the strong, and the strong are not to despise the weak. These things are matters of conscience, and depend much for their solution on the degree to which souls have attained. The subject terminates with the grand truth which must never be obscured by details that we are to receive, one another, as Christ has received us, to the glory of God. In the rest of chapter 15 the apostle dwells on the extent of his apostleship, renews his expression of the thought and hope of visiting Rome, and at the same time shows how well he remembered the need of the poor at Jerusalem. Romans 16:1-27; Romans 16:1-27 brings before us in the most. instructive and interesting manner the links that grace practically forms and maintains between the saints of God. Though he had never visited Rome, many of them were known personally. It is exquisite the delicate love with which he singles out distinctive features in each of the saints, men and women, that come before him. Would that the Lord would give us hearts to remember, as well as eyes to see, according to His own grace! Then follows a warning against those who bring in stumbling-blocks and offences. There is evil at work, and grace does not close the eye to danger; at the same time it is never under the pressure of the enemy, and there is the fullest confidence that the God of peace will break the power of Satan under the feet of the saints shortly.

Last of all, the apostle links up this fundamental treatise of divine righteousness in its doctrine, its dispensational bearings, and its exhortations to the walk of Christians, with higher truth, which it would not have been suitable then to bring out; for grace considers the state and the need of the saints. True ministry gives out not merely truth, but suited truth to the saints. At the same time the apostle does allude to that mystery which was not yet divulged at least, in this epistle; but he points from the foundations of eternal truth to those heavenly heights that were reserved for other communications in due time.

Bibliographical Information
Kelly, William. "Commentary on Romans 5:1". Kelly Commentary on Books of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/​commentaries/​wkc/​romans-5.html. 1860-1890.
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