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– 1 Timothy 3:15

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5. JUSTIFICATION BRINGS BLESSINGS

The word ‘therefore’ at the beginning of Romans 5:1 (in the NIV) is a very significant connecting word. It has the sense of ‘because of “A”, therefore “B”’. Because of justification by faith, therefore peace and its other attendant blessings become ever present realities. This is the message in Romans 5:1-5. Where one used to stand in the wrath and judgement of God through one’s hostility to God in sin; now, one can enjoy peace with God through one’s justification by faith in Jesus.

Peace is the opposite of wrath and condemnation. It has the sense of wholesomeness and general well-being. It is not only just the absence of hostility or conflict but it possesses a quality of calmness and collectedness that can prevail over tumult and turmoil. As used by Paul, this peace is ‘peace with God’ (5:1) and it comes to us because of our faith in Jesus Christ. In the way Paul has signified it, ‘peace with God’ suggests reconciliation with God (see 5:9-11) and thus, it can also connote salvation - the state of being ‘saved from God’s wrath’. Where once we lived in disobedience in sin against God, now we live in obedience in faith in his Son Jesus Christ. Where once we suffered from guilt and condemnation, now we receive forgiveness and salvation; the result of which is ‘peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ’.

This ‘peace with God’ opens another door of blessing for us who have been justified through faith in Jesus Christ. We have ‘gained access by faith’ into the grace of God (5:2a). ‘Access’ is ‘the means or the opportunity to enter a place’. It can also connote ‘the right or opportunity to use or benefit from something’. Put together, Paul is informing us that we now have entered and benefited from the grace of God ‘in which we now stand’. The grace of God has to do with his love which seeks to justify us freely through the redemptive blood of Jesus Christ (3:23-25). This grace also involves the promise to Abraham which made him ‘a father of many nations’ (4:16-17) - an all-inclusive promise which brings not only the blood descendants of Abraham, the circumcised, but also his spiritual offsprings, the ones who come ‘by faith’, the uncircumcised, into the sanctuary of God. All have ‘gained access’ into this sanctuary of grace because all have been ‘credited’ with ‘righteousness’ for the faith they have in Jesus. No distinction is made between Jew and Gentile; no one is excluded from this grace of God on grounds of ethnicity or other social lines of distinction. The critical criterion is faith in Jesus Christ.

Peace and access into grace form a basis for the believer to ‘rejoice in the hope of the glory of God’ (5:2b). Before, as an unbeliever, a person fell ‘short of the glory of God’ (3:23); now, however, as a believer, the person enjoys ‘peace with God’ and has access into God’s grace, and because of these, he can reasonably rejoice, or, boast, or, bask in ‘the hope of the glory of God’. Hope is not already having or in the possession of, but is an expectation of ‘what we do not yet have’ and for this ‘we wait patiently’ (8:25). This ‘hope of the glory of God’ provides us not only the fortitude and the patience to persist in faith, but it also tests the very fibre of faith itself. As written of Abraham, the great patriarch, ‘against all hope’, ‘in hope believed and so became the father of many nations’ (4:18) - a testimony to the strength of Abraham’s faith tested against the oft ‘gloom’ that is the pervasive companion to this thing called ‘hope’.

Yet, in the Christian’s instance, there is no room for gloom to accompany hope. For the Christian, it is all positive hope. This is so because hope in the Christian is produced in him through the proactive action of God: ‘God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit’ (5:5). And because of what God has done for us, our feet are on solid and certain ground; so much so that we can ‘also rejoice in our sufferings’ (5:3a). In secular circles, ‘rejoice’ is not altogether to be associated with ‘sufferings’; but it is in the Christian spiritual realm. We can ‘rejoice in our sufferings’ because ‘we know (for certain) that suffering produces perseverance’ (5:3b). Perseverance is the stubborn, unyielding driving force that takes the Christian through the most difficult of circumstances. This perseverance is prompted and abetted by faith in God. Where others will have given up long ago, the Christian perseveres through great storms with faith and hope as his enduring and conquering companions.

Perseverance gives forth character (5:4), the quality of mental and moral distinctiveness in a person that has been put to and passed the test. This character is a Christian character, shaped and honed by Christ and the Holy Spirit. Where at one time a person’s character may call him to ‘invent’ all ‘ways of doing evil’ (1:30), now in Christ, the reformed character yields to the good will of God. And character itself produces hope (5:4), which takes us back to ‘the hope of the glory of God’. Thus, we see that hope reinforces itself through its acting out in perseverance against suffering. As Paul would have it, ‘hope does not disappoint us’ (5:5); there is no gloom in the Christian hope.

Archive
The Romans Series
1. Being the Community of God’s People
2. Ethno-Religious Tensions
3. The Power and the Wrath of God
4. Justification by Faith
5. Justification Brings Blessings
6. While We Were Still Sinners
7. Died to Sin
8. Slaves to Righteousness
9. The Difference of the Spirit
10. The Israel Problem
11. The Gentile Problem
12. Community Living
13. Community Unity
14. Community Ethics
15. Loving the Enemy Ethic
16. Extra-Community Ethics
17. The Weak and the Strong
18. Community Formation
19. Paul, the Minister
20. Gems in Greetings

Articles on The Da Vinci Code, Gnosticism and
the Gospel of Judas
1. The Da Vinci Code: A Christian Response
2. The Nag Hammadi Documents and Gnosticism
3. The Gospel of Judas
4. The Gospel of Judas - A Retake
5. Teachings in the Gospel of Judas Compared (Part 1)
6. Teachings in the Gospel of Judas Compared (Part 2)
7. Teachings in the Gospel of Judas Compared (Part 3)
8. Canonicity and the Gospel of Judas

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