In chapter 4, Paul showed us how God values faith rather than the Law, and that this principle of faith had been with the people since at least the time of Abraham and Sarah–that God had blessed them because of their faith and not because of any other merit on their parts. Paul adds that the righteousness given by God to them for their faithfulness was not for them alone, but for us too, as their descendants and heirs.
In chapter 5, Paul describes our relationship with God that comes through our faith that we need not despair even in the worst of times because we have God with us. Paul’s words here echo that of Jesus in John 3:16-18 “For God so loved the world that God gave Jesus, that whoever believes in Jesus shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send Jesus into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Christ. Whoever believes in Jesus is not condemned…” Paul further explains how Adam’s disobedience brought sin and death into the world, but Jesus’ obedience to God brought forgiveness and life eternal.
Romans 5:1-5
Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out God’s love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom God has given us.
Paul begins by saying that because we have faith, God has chosen to forgive us our sins and declare us innocent of wrongdoing, regardless of what the sins and wrongdoing were. Consequently, we don’t ever have to be afraid of God any more–we can have peace in our hearts, because God is at peace with us. Jesus has ushered un into God’s presence which is a place of safe harbor. Because of our faith in Jesus, we’re in “God’s good graces.” We’ve got a right to rejoice! Since we can face the world in peace and harmony with God, then we can focus all our energies toward becoming all that God intends for us to be.
Some religions teach that God is the all-knowing, all-seeing eye, ready to zap us when we do wrong. Others teach that God is far-off and totally disinterested in the day to day problems of humankind–that all God is interested in is swift and total obedience–that God is into regimentation–that everything and everyone must conform to one way of doing and being. To some, God’s “key words” are wrath and judgment and punishment. Paul says that’s not right at all. Our faith in Jesus cancels all that out. God’s not the all seeing people zapper, the enemy of the people, the distant, authoritarian figure. God is offering intimacy with us. God wants to be there to guide our paths and help us over life’s rough spots. God’s “key words” here are peace and justification and grace. At this point, we no longer have to worry about what others may say about whether or not homosexuality is a sin. It makes no difference what our sins are. It is our faith that makes us right with God, not our lack of sins. It is our faith that welcomes us into intimacy with God.
Not only that, but most of us are familiar with the concept of the “God of the common cold.” That is, when we have sorrows and afflictions, there are those who would tell us that we bring these about ourselves due to our sexuality. According to these nay Sayers, these afflictions are our punishments from God for being who we are. We don’t have to buy into those lies any more. We are at peace with God. We know that anything that befalls us, if it is of God, is for our benefit. Therefore, we can even look at our afflictions not as punishment, but as opportunities to grow. That which hurts us makes us stronger. Pain gives us the strength to persevere; perseverance makes us stronger people, and our very strength gives us hope. And if we hope for better things we will not be disappointed. God had given us a great gift: The Holy Spirit, given to us by the outpouring of God’s love into our hearts.
Romans 5:6-11
You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates God’s own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since we have now been justified by Christ’s blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Christ! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of Jesus, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through Christ’s life! Not only is this so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.
God never saw us as powerful people to be taken down. Without God human beings were totally without power. God knew this. Even so, Christ died for us. This was God’s ultimate proof of God’s love fro us. Hardly anyone would die for a good person–though if one were extraordinary, then there might be someone willing to die for them. But God wanted to show us what God’s love was all about. Even though we human beings were still sinners, Christ died for us. God did not want us to remain alienated. Christ’s death allowed us intimacy with God, without any doing or earning of worthiness on our part. Indeed, there was nothing any or all of us could do that would be so great as to merit Christ’s death and the salvation that death brought. It was a gift to us, pure and simple, to demonstrate god’s love and kindness and gentleness towards us, even though we’d done nothing to deserve it.
There was a time when human beings could have been considered God’s enemies. When Jesus died He opened the door and ushered us into God’s presence. God declared us innocent–justified. No longer enemies but reconciled to God. God’s friends. This should give us cause to rejoice! Not only that, but Jesus didn’t stay dead. He rose again, to teach us that death is not final. If we have faith in Him and in what He taught, we too will be saved.
These verses were an emphatic demonstration of the concept of God’s unquenchable love for us. They said that:
What do these 5 points mean for homosexuals? They are the answers for all the doubting Thomases and Thomasinas who, in spite of the evidence to the contrary, still believe that homosexuality is a sin, and this “sin” alienates them from God. It means this:
Some of you might challenge: If this is a gift given without my having to do something to earn it, why must I have faith? Why can’t I just have it, period–with or without faith? The answer is this: If I tell you you’re beautiful, but you don’t believe me, you’ll never know the joy of being beautiful, of feeling beautiful. Without faith in what I said, you’ll never experience the beauty I see in you. You might say, “I need only to look in the mirror to see my beauty.” Then your faith would be in the mirror–to reflect you accurately and not distorted. But a mirror can only reflect the outer beauty it sees, while I can see the beauty that resides in your heart. Either way, you must have faith to receive the joy that comes from your beauty–either faith in my, or faith in the mirror. More to the point, you can experience the joy of your salvation only when you have faith in the God who sees only beauty in you.
More importantly, there’s this little monkey wrench that prevents God from giving us salvation without faith. The monkey wrench I’m talking about is another gift given to us by God–perhaps the most important one, we think. It’s called free will. God has given us the absolute right to reject God and any and all of God’s gifts to us–including salvation. It is God’s irrevocable gift to us.
The only way around it is faith. We must become willing to surrender a small portion of ourselves–our pride, our egos, our absolute autonomy–and admit that perhaps we don’t necessarily have all the answers. Perhaps there is a better way. Perhaps there is a way to fill that emptiness, that void that seems never to quite go away. We must become willing to be willing to trust in someone we can’t see, hear, feel, touch or taste. That’s why so often the trust can come only when we have nowhere else to turn. As the saying goes, “When you’re flat on your back, there’s only one way to look…Up”!
Notice that I said “willing to be willing.” It really doesn’t take very much. Just all that you have! But that may not be much. “…Faith as small as a mustard seed…” (Matt. 17:20) is all that Jesus said was required. A mustard seed is the smallest of all seeds, but it grows to a mighty tree, just as our faith can grow.
The ultimate gift of our faith comes when we discover that we indeed can come to see, hear and actually experience God–personally and individually. That’s the ultimate gift. When you, the sinner, can come face to face with God and not be struck down dead, can experience God working in your life, when you can know the guidance of the Holy Spirit in your very soul, then you will understand what Paul meant in Romans 8:31, If God be for us, who can be against us? Then you will know that nothing that anyone says against you means anything. You have to answer only to God. And God delights in you, just as you are.
Romans 5:12-15
Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one person, and death through sin, and in this way death came to everyone, because all sinned–for before the Law was given, sin was in the world, But sin is not taken into account when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam and Eve to the time of Moses and Zipporah, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who was a pattern of the One to come.
Paul takes the Romans back to Genesis 2:17 where God said to our first parents, “…But you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of Good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.” God did not mean they would die immediately, as though they had taken poison. Up to now, death in the world did not exist. There was no death in the Garden, no aging, illness or decay. Banishment from the Garden exposed them to true human life with all it’s cycles, including death. Since we are all children of our first parents, we are exposed to the same cycles to which they were exposed. Because they sinned, the inclination to sin was carried forward from them to all human beings.
Now the Law did not exist before the time of Moses and Zipporah, but that was many generations after Adam and Eve. Sin was in the world all this time, but because there was no law, God did not count their sins against the people. However, as I mentioned earlier in the chapter, every sin requires retribution. The retribution for humankind was death.
Now, you might think: This doesn’t make sense. If there was no law, how could there be sin? There’s a big difference between being moral and being lawful, and one can certainly act in unkind ways that while not being against the law, may certainly be immoral. We’ll discuss this more when we speak of the Law later in this study.
Romans 5:15-19
For the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the One, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! Again, the gift of God is not like the result of the one person’s sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespassed and brought justification. For if, by the trespass of the one person, death reigned through that one person, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one person, Jesus Christ. Consequently, just as the result of one trespass was condemnation for everyone, so also the result of one act of righteousness was justification that brings life for everyone. For just as through the disobedience of the one person, the many the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one person the many will be made righteous.
What Paul says in these paragraphs he says more clearly and succinctly in 1 Corinthians 15:21 & 22: “For since death came through a man, the resurrection of the dead comes also through a man. For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive.” Paul had created a sorry sight of a picture. As children of Adam we all have the propensity of Adam–to sin–to be led astray, if not by our spouses or our families, then by our own innate desires. For even though we are God’s creations, made in God’s own image and likeness, we all have a “Bit of the devil” in us. The Hebrew word, which is translated as serpent in the Bible, comes from a root-word meaning hiss, but it also means enchanter, which in turn can mean one who bewitches. Is there any one of us who hasn’t been bewitched from time to time, led astray by our passions and desires for wealth, power, and sex? I’m afraid we all have. That’s our connection to our first parents, and consequently, the reason why we’re subject to death. The actions of our first parents brought nothing but judgment, condemnation and death.
Then comes Jesus–The Gift. Jesus brings what our first parents could never bring–Jesus brings choice, grace, righteousness, justification and, most of all, the promise of eternal life. Now, we don’t get to choose our innate desires. We inherit them from our parents, our civilization, and from our subconscious individual interpretations of our environments. The coming of Jesus gave us the opportunity to choose to subdue our innate sinful desires for a greater good. The coming of Jesus brought the boundless kindness of God’s merciful grace. Our willingness to follow Jesus’ path through faith justifies us, makes us righteous and leads to eternal life. Following Jesus’ path is what reconciles us to God. That reconciliation must come as an action of God to us. There’s no way, no action we can take to effect a reconciliation–no way we can earn righteousness. We can only accept it as it is given to us from God thought our faith in Jesus.
Romans 5:20-21
The Law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Christ Jesus our sovereign.
When the Law was added, sin was increased. That’s because the Law is impossible to keep in its entirety. But we don’t have to worry about that, because at the same time that sin increased, God’s grace increased even more.
In Luke chapter 7 Jesus gives examples of how the knowledge of ever increasing grace as a result of trespass is good. Jesus told the story to Simon the Pharisee of the moneylender who canceled two debts–one who owed $50 and one who owed $500. “Which,” Jesus asked, “will love the moneylender more?” “I suppose the one who had the bigger debt canceled,” replied Simon. “You have judged correctly,” Jesus said.
Then Jesus turned to a woman who had been ministering to Jesus–wetting his feet with her tears, wiping them with her hair and pouring perfume on them. Jesus turned to Simon and told him that he had done nothing for Jesus since Jesus had arrived, but by contrast the woman had not stopped ministering to him. Jesus said, ‘Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven–for she loved much. But the one who has been forgiven little loves little.”
We can bask in the gospel–the “Good News” of Jesus Christ. However little or abundant our sins are, our faith in Jesus brings reconciliation to God. We can hold our heads up high. Because we are free!