How Great is the name of Jesus, all earth trembles, the darkness flees and everyone on earth will sing praises to him – hallelujah.
”My Name represents everything of who I am and not only the whole earth but the whole universe trembles at My Name as I reveal its power and holiness. It is against the backdrop of that power and holiness that I pour out My unfailing love on My whole creation. My love is there for everyone who desires to experience it, it is there for all those who become conscious of it. But it is ignored by the vast majority of mankind – who seek to follow their own ways. Open your eyes all you who read this and see My love, by faith and you will experience it, taste it, feel it and share in it.”
In Romans ch 4:25 Paul comes to an end of his explanation of the statement he made in 1:17 “For in the gospel a righteousness is revealed, a righteousness that is by faith from first to last”. In ch 5 he moves on to discuss the last part of that vs: “The righteous will live by faith”. He has carefully in 3 and a half chapters explained how God has imputed righteousness on all who believe and trust in the death and resurrection of Jesus as the means through which His righteousness is exchanged for our unrighteousness. He is now going to show how this will empower the lives of every believer – how “the righteous will live by faith.(Romans 1:17b)
This section extends till 8:39, but starts with a kind of preamble or summary. So please read 5:1-11. We will deal with this in two bites.
In 5:1 he starts with the word “therefore,” which clearly links to what has been said up to now.
There are 5 things which arise from the concept of a life which has been declared righteous (IOW justified).
5:1 We have peace with God. This statement must be seen against the statement in Romans 5:10 “when we were God’s enemies. God reconciled us” . Friends it is so important to realise the seriousness of the state of every unbeliever. Until you are reconciled by faith you are at war with the very One who created you. What a privilege we have to experience the release from that and we should never underestimate it.
5:2 We now have access by faith. It is only after we are reconciled with God that we now have free access to Him. The whole of the OT shows how distant and separate a holy God is from his people.
5:2 We now stand in God’s grace. The Greek wording describes something like a ship at sea tossed and torn by the wind and storms, being ushered into a safe harbour, fully protected from the weather. Every believer now stands in that position. Our feet firmly held, not by our own strength but by God’s power.
We rejoice: We have every reason to 5:3 – “in the hope of the glory of God”. God’s glory is short-hand of what heaven is going to hold for us all. We will experience face to face, God’s glory. This is not a vague hope but a Christian certainty and we have every reason to rejoice.
We also rejoice in our sufferings: 5:3. A strange statement but it opens the way for a much deeper discussion on suffering later in ch 8. But here we are to see that suffering always has a purpose, even though it may not seem like it. The purpose here is described as a number of steps which will ultimately lead to strengthening our hope as we become more like Jesus.
How do we know we can be sure of this promise? 5:5 speaks of hope not disappointing us, which simply means we will never be let down and the guarantee of that is mentioned in that same vs, through the presence of The Holy Spirit within us, who has been poured into the heart of every believer.
This passage is such a beautiful, succinct description of the benefits of being justified and the life that opens up for the Christian, that I read it over regularly. I hope you are experiencing a strengthening of your faith. As we work through this amazing book. God bless you all till next week.