Romans 5:12-8:39 The Cross and the Resurrection
Romans chapters 1 to 8 form a unit but thus section is divided into two parts. The first part is Romans 1:1-5:11 and focuses in sins that separate us from God and how the blood of Jesus justifies us from the consequences of these sins. God now sees his people as being righteous:
“ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.” Romans 3:23-25
“However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness.” Romans 4:5
“He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” Romans 4:25
What makes a person a sinner? The simple answer is that we become sinners when we sin. Paul gives us a more profound answer, we sin because we are sinners, There is an inherent bias in all of us to want to do what we know God will hate. The death of Christ achieves our forgiveness through his ‘blood’ and changes our hearts through the ‘cross.’ These are the two words Paul uses for these two functions of the death of Christ abbreviated
The second part Romans 5:12 to 8:39 focuses on the new sanctified life that Christians live because the cross of Christ is always before them:
“Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness.” Romans 6:19
“But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.” Romans 6:22
Note the change, Paul is now addressing in this second part our underlying problem of our propensity to sin.
These are the two vital features, justification and then sanctification, that the death and resurrection of Jesus is able to resolve.
Paiul also says that he resurrection of Jesus has these two effects. In the first part the resurrection is the evidence that we have been justified, our sins have been forgiven:
“ He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.” Romans 4:25
In the second part the resurrection of Jesus is said to impart a new life on his people::
“Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.” Romans 6:13-14
In the second part it is no longer sins that are being forgiven but sinners who are being changed. They are not just considered to be legally righteous but their behaviour will change so they become very different people. The Bible is clear that no-one can ever live a life that fully pleases God but in Christ, and in him alone, we can be both forgiven and have the power to live new quality of life, what he calls ‘a righteous life’ in the fur.
““For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.” Romans 5:19
There is something in all of us that is attracted to behave in a way that we know God disapproves of. A bishop in Australia was travelling in a train and was sitting in a carriage compartment all on his own. ?he saw a notice on the way that said:
“Spitting is forbidden”
His immediate reaction was to want to spit, just a bit. In Romans chapter 7 the flesh and the Spirit are said to be in conflict:
“Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me.” Romans 7:21=23
When a person becomes a Christian their sins are completely forgiven but the desire to sin remains. God wants to change that and that also isa consequence of the cross. Paul answer this dilemma by first reminding them that Jesus had won complete forgiveness through his blood, his death. However that self same death has done more fore us, it also enables us to overcome those temptations that continue to assault us.
“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:1-2
When we remember what cost Jesus to forgive our sin we will inevitably come to hate the sin that sent him there:
“The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.” Romans 8:6-7
The evidence that a person is born again, is that a Christian has an ongoing desire to live in and for the Lord Jesus.
BVP
