[0:00] Now, we're going to be looking at these three verses in chapter 5.
[0:16] ! In the first four chapters, with regard to humanity's need of salvation, with regard to humanity's inability to do anything about that state of affairs, that is what Paul has been engaged in and moving relentlessly towards this great conclusion.
[1:08] Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God. Now, Paul announced the major theme of his in the first chapter of Romans in verse 17.
[1:31] It's where he says, In the gospel, verse 17, In the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith.
[1:51] As it is written, the righteous shall live by faith. For in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed. Now, that is a powerful statement, and it's a very, very important statement.
[2:09] You've got to just take this in and get it in deep to you. The righteousness of God. Paul has just been setting out the unrighteousness of the pagan world, his contemporary pagan world.
[2:26] He's just been setting out the failure of righteousness of the Jewish people, who, though they had the law, though they had the covenant, though they were the people of God, what was the problem?
[2:42] They were hearers of it only, and not doers. And what Paul is saying is, there is nothing in the human effort that can even contribute to man and woman's greatest need, which is being found in a state of acceptance and righteousness before God.
[3:14] This is the only way that human beings can be put on a right footing and standing before God.
[3:33] not through any program, moral or otherwise, or any kind of effort at trying to keep the Ten Commandments.
[3:46] Because the problem is that when the mirror, if you like, of the Ten Commandments is held up before us, it actually convicts us, it makes us even more conscious of how far we have fallen short of that moral code, if you like.
[4:07] I think somewhere, it might be in Romans, Paul might have said something like, had there been a righteousness that could have done it, it would have been this moral code, if you like, of the Ten Commandments.
[4:24] But the problem isn't so much with the code or with the moral law or anything else, the problem is with us. Our nature, centred around principally ourselves, is not able to put the moral code of the law into practice.
[4:57] And that is why Paul has taken the trouble to present a closely argued case for his conclusion that we have been justified by faith.
[5:17] Now, let me just make sure that people understand what it is for God to justify you by faith.
[5:28] put in a simple way, it is when you hear the gospel and you hear about Jesus Christ and you hear about how he has died for our sins and risen again and he's been exalted to the right hand of God and he's coming again.
[5:49] And he did that for us. He was the Christ for us, for you and me. If we put our trust in Jesus Christ and put our trust in that message and in that gospel, God will regard us as righteous.
[6:07] He will regard us as righteous. Now, there's a theologian that I particularly like.
[6:19] His name is Carol Barth and he puts it this way when thinking of righteousness, we are what we are not. Let me explain.
[6:30] When God declares us righteousness, it's precisely that. It's a declaration of righteousness. He's not saying that we and our interior being is righteous.
[6:48] He's not saying that. He's saying the righteousness that I'm declaring about you is your status and your standing before God. It's something that's a fact, not a feeling.
[7:01] It's something that's objective, not subjective. But it's critically needed for every single human being.
[7:15] And therefore, I have to ask you tonight, is your status before God righteous? In other words, have you fled for refuge to Jesus Christ so that you will be able to have that declaration by God?
[7:40] Since we have been justified, notice the language there, have been, it's an event, it's a statement that God has stated in the past and it continues unchanged.
[8:07] But then he says this, through him, that's through Jesus, we have also obtained access, sorry, sorry, I'm way ahead there, that's not what I'm wanting to say.
[8:26] Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God here. So, what I'm doing for the rest of the time I've got is sharing with you the blessings of being righteous before God.
[8:40] And the first blessing that Paul mentions here is peace with God. Now, I want you to again notice the language, he's not saying peace of God as if pointing to a kind of, again, interior or subjective feeling that we might have inside us that we feel this wonderful peace.
[9:08] I'm not saying you shouldn't feel that or you will not feel that or you cannot feel that, but it's not in fact the peace that Paul is speaking about here. Paul says, if you have been declared righteous by God, we have peace with God.
[9:30] And so, in other words, the unspoken text is there must have been a point prior to this peace with God that there was no peace with God between God and us.
[9:44] peace. And, of course, that is the case. But, through Christ's sacrifice and atoning death, it is no longer the case that there is this possibility of peace with God, this objective and this factual peace and this peace that is a declaration by God.
[10:10] God, he says, we have peace. Notice that. And if we ask who the we is, it's what I've been saying all the time.
[10:24] It's those who have placed their trust in Jesus Christ. peace. And this peace is achieved, as I'm saying, through Jesus Christ.
[10:46] And I want to just read some verses to you from Romans chapter 3 verse 21. Paul says at this point, but now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe, for there is no distinction, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
[11:27] And then at verse 25, this is a key statement of Paul that explains how God can pronounce and declare people righteous who come believing in Jesus Christ and his sacrifice.
[11:45] Listen to what he says. whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith.
[12:05] Now, this is, if you like, maybe not a word that's a common word in our vocabulary, but the idea of propitiation is to take away, if you like, the anger of a God, or to induce the God to do something for us.
[12:34] Now, but normally in propitiation, as you will appreciate, it's the puny human being that is engaging in trying to propitiate the God.
[12:48] that this is not that kind of propitiation at all. Did you notice what you just read? Whom God put forward.
[13:00] This is the most unusual propitiation that we probably could ever read about, that God put forward his own son, that God put forward God to be a propitiation.
[13:14] I'm not sure how helpful the word propitiation is. I quite like a guy called Anselm who lived in the 10th century and who used the concept of satisfaction.
[13:30] And Paul goes on to say that this propitiation or this satisfaction by God who organized the propitiation himself, if you like, who purposed it and planned it and who put his son forward in that propitiation.
[13:58] Paul says it was to show his righteousness so that he might be just and the justifier of the one that has faith in Jesus.
[14:11] So, whatever we understand about that propitiation or if you like the word satisfaction, it's partly God has done this so that everything about God, his righteousness and his justice and his glory and his love are preserved.
[14:37] And this peace with God catapults us into a new relationship with God, a relationship of intimacy, a relationship of hope, a relationship of joy, a relationship of salvation.
[14:56] salvation. So, the first benefit or blessing of being justified is to have this peace with God.
[15:08] And the second one is, he said, access into this grace wherein we stand. Through him, verse 2, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace wherein we stand.
[15:23] there are really two things here, the access and the ground that we're standing on of grace. As far as God is concerned, if we have put our trust in Christ, if we know him as our savior, then we're in what God would call and classify us as in a state of grace.
[15:47] God's grace and God's love and God's forgiveness and God's salvation. And you see, this grace that we have been given access into and upon the ground of which we stand is the driving force, I would suggest, behind the whole plan of redemption.
[16:15] it is, grace is God's infinite kindness and capacity for love, not because the one loved has anything to elicit that love, but because this is what God is like.
[16:36] God's grace is the eternal fountain from which all his goodness and mercy flows. Only Christ could have brought us into and given us access into this grace of God, into God's presence.
[16:56] You imagine if somebody would love to have an opportunity of getting into the presence, I don't know, of the king or of some other royal person or of some other important person.
[17:09] They might need a sponsor, they might need an advocate, they might need somebody who can enable them to get into that place that they want to go. The one that enabled you and I to get into that ground of grace, to have that access into that grace, that rock of grace wherein we stand as believers in Christ, is Christ himself.
[17:36] we are never beyond the reach of grace and we don't need to re-earn our access into that ground of grace every day, so long as we remember that our access is always and only through Jesus Christ.
[18:01] Jesus acts as our advocate and priest, bringing us into the throne room of God's presence and unending grace. This idea of standing conveys the safety and security of our status of righteousness before God.
[18:21] God, this idea of standing and continual access indicates that our justification, our status of righteousness, will never alter.
[18:35] The grace that saved us is the grace that will always be available to us forever. We no longer stand on the quicksand of his wrath and condemnation, but of his grace.
[18:49] grace. It means that the mode of God's relating to us and treating us will always be based on grace.
[19:02] There is the second benefit. The first benefit is peace with God. The second benefit is access into this grace in which we stand.
[19:17] I wonder, have you been led in to that wonderful ground of grace by Jesus Christ? Finally, the third benefit and blessing is the hope of the glory of God.
[19:40] God. Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God. We have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand.
[19:55] And thirdly, we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. God. In a sense, I think this statement, we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, in a sense, I think this statement in some ways is the climax to those three benefits that I've been sharing with you from Romans chapter 5, 1, 2.
[20:28] because it's the hope of seeing our glorified. It's called the hope of glory, and we want to ask ourselves, what can we take from that statement?
[20:44] Paul had already said, of course, in Romans 3, 23, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
[20:54] And what I think Paul was doing there when he put it that way. He could have said all have sinned and fallen short of the standard or the righteousness of God or something like that, but he said the fallen short of the glory of God.
[21:12] And I feel that Paul may have had in his mind the creation of mankind, of humanity. I feel because mankind, men and women, were and are in the image of God.
[21:34] We were created to reflect the glory of God, to reflect that splendor in some way, and that holiness in some way, be ye holy holy, for I am holy, for I am holy, and that grace even the law came by Moses says John, grace and truth came by Jesus Christ Jesus said in John's gospel in chapter 17 and verse 24 in his great prayer Jesus said this Father I desire that they also whom you have given me may be with me where I am to see my glory that you have given me if you're a believer in Christ if you're a Christian one day you will look upon the glory of the Son of God and the glory that God the Father gave him when he was with him before he became incarnate but also there are indications that we will share in some way in this very
[23:22] God-like attribute and characteristic God's glory not essentially but derivative derivatively and in terms of reflection there's a wonderful poet called Gerald Manley Hopkins whom I studied at university and did an essay on one of his poems I love the way that it begins the world is charged with the grandeur of God in some way we'll be charged by the grandeur of God we will know him and we will see him because we will be like him that original image of
[24:30] God will be fully restored and this is not a vague and wishful thinking but is rooted in God's purpose for all his redeemed people when will it be realized is it a work in progress is it progressive or is it happening in an instant both I can't remember the verse off the top of my head but it's something like this as we look into the mirror we are changed bit by bit into the glory of God of course when Christ comes it will be complete and no wonder
[25:35] I think it says here we rejoice in hope of the glory of God this morning I was preaching and co-winning and I was preaching a completely different sermon but one of the things that I was trying to achieve was this do we meditate enough on our unspeakably magnificent future as Christians no wonder Paul declares in Romans 8 of his letter I think it's verse 18 he says that you might almost say quite maybe I'm not right here I was going to say quite calmly maybe he's not maybe he's fired up with great excitement anyway he says for I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed in us
[27:01] Christian brothers and sisters us is that not an unspeakably magnificent hope that is ours as believers in Jesus Christ as I close let me ask you this question do you have peace with God with God even if you're not feeling it even if it's not bubbling up within you but do you have that peace with God through trusting Jesus Christ alone and if not it can be yours right now not by trying harder but by trusting completely in Christ do you have a future tonight that's worth boasting about because you know in that chapter five there the word that is translated in the
[28:23] ESV as rejoice could have been translated boasting and if there's any justification for boasting ever here's one in this unbelievable future that God has in store for you and for me let me ask you this as well do you have the faith of Abraham and let me just go back to that faith because I think it is very very important for the argument that Paul is using there's no way that Abraham's faith was a pseudo faith there is no way that his faith was just a profession of words listen to the characteristics as we close of Abraham's faith and ask yourself this question is that my faith does that describe my faith in hope he believed against hope that he should be the father of many nations now we in living in western society we might think we've got a situation like that the collapse of
[30:17] Christianity is there can we still believe against hope people might look at the stats they might look at the reduction on the closing of churches they might look at the secularism that we feel is so strong in our culture we might look at the indifference in hope Abraham believed against hope that he should become the father of many nations and then look at that second characteristic in verse 19 he did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body and the barrenness of Sarah's womb I think that is magnificent he stared into the hopelessness and his faith did not weaken no unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of
[31:28] God but he grew strong in his faith and gave glory to God fully convinced that God was able to do what he promised what does that suggest to me he must have been walking a very very close walk with God that is why says Paul his faith was counted for righteousness it was the real thing it was so authentic it was given by God Amen and may the Lord bless our thoughts of these verses of Romans chapter 5 verses 1 and 2 from