ROMANS 5
It is of great importance to see the character of the believer’s justification. Jesus our Lord has been raised from among the dead for our justification. He is clear of all the offences for which He was delivered, so as to be introduced without spot or stain into the scene of God’s resurrection power. It is not a perfectly righteous Man living here for our justification, but One who has died, and been raised by God from among the dead. This evidently has in view an entirely new order of things where the power of sin and death is no longer known, As living in the world we were marked by offences, and were subject to the judgment of God, but Jesus our Lord was delivered for our offences, and entered into death for us. He has taken up all that we were under, He has maintained all that was due to God with reference to it, and now God has raised Him for our justification. We are justified in view of living in an entirely new order of things for the pleasure of God. Not justified so as to be relieved of the fear of judgment and left to go on with the “present evil world” (Galatians 1: 4) which is marked by lawlessness and lust, but justified in view of having a place in relation to Christ in what we may speak of as God’s world. To apprehend this makes an immense difference practically to the soul, and it is most important in view of what follows in the teaching of this epistle.
[p. 73] In the present world everything is under sin and death, but if we have any knowledge of God at all we must be sure that He will not leave things like that. He is not going to allow Satan to have it all his own way; He will most certainly triumph over all the power of the enemy, and will in His own time set aside all the lawlessness that, has come in. He will bring in His own glory, and have a world where sin and death will not be supreme as they are in this world, but where His rule will be known in untold blessing. This is what Scripture speaks of as the world to come; it has ever been in the view of faith. It will be introduced by the personal return of the Lord Jesus Christ, who will bring all lawlessness under judgment, and who will introduce righteousness and peace and the blessed knowledge of God into the scene which has been so long characterised by the will of the fallen creature. The world to come will be marked by resurrection power, for the Son of man who will be supreme in it will be so as having tasted death for everything, and as having been raised by the mighty power of God. And the saints who will reign with Him will have been raised or changed. Satan will be bound, and the power of sin and death set aside.
Now if God justifies, we may be sure that He does not do it in view of giving us a place in the world which is in every way contrary to His mind, but He justifies in view of His own world. The believer is accounted righteous for that world, so that he can go into it without stain or reproach, no charge can be brought against him. We are justified for the world where all is suitable to God, where divine glory will shine, and which comes under the administration [p. 74] of the Lord Jesus Christ. That administration is not future to faith; it is a present reality. One has heard persons say that they would like to live in the millennium, but the Lord Jesus Christ is now enthroned at the right hand of God, and it is possible to come under His administration now. We have not to wait for the good of God’s world until that world is publicly manifested — though we do rejoice in hope of it — but we come into it as under the present administration of the Lord Jesus Christ. As justified we come into that new order of things free from all charge or imputation of sin. And we come into it to be under the present sway of God in His kingdom, to be henceforth marked by righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. So that what will mark the world to come is seen in its moral features in those who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and who walk in the Spirit. We become, as James says, “a certain firstfruits of his creatures”.
We have been “justified on the principle of faith”, for we are not justified in ourselves, but in Another Man. It is “by faith of Jesus Christ”, as Paul says to the Galatians, and he adds, “We also have believed on Christ Jesus, that we might be justified on the principle of the faith of Christ”, and he speaks of believers as “seeking to be justified in Christ”, Galatians 2: 16, 17. “In him every one that believes is justified”, Acts 13: 39. Indeed, we know from 1 Corinthians 1: 30 that Christ Jesus is made righteousness to us.
The result of having been justified in this wondrous way is that “we have peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ”. This is the state of our souls Godward, and it is the first effect of coming under [p. 80] the administration of our Lord Jesus Christ. There [p. 75] are no more harassing thoughts, no misgivings, no uncertainty. The whole outlook of the soul Godward is cloudless peace. There is not a question of guilt to distress, not an accusing voice to be heard. The believer is like Noah looking up into a clear sky after the waters of judgment were all gone from the face of the earth. Or like Israel when they saw their enemies dead on the seashore, and were able to acclaim Jehovah as their strength, their song, and their salvation. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the great and glorious Administrator of peace towards God. It is not only the result of redemption, and of our being justified, but it is administered to us “through our Lord Jesus Christ”. It is the risen and exalted One at the right hand of God who dispenses it to us.
We come in this chapter, for the first time in the epistle, to this full title of “our Lord Jesus Christ”. (He is so spoken of in the introductory verses of chapter 1, but I refer to the teaching of the epistle.) As the exalted One at the right hand of God He is set up as the glorious Administrator of divine grace. We can conceive what a wondrous time it will be when He exercises public administration in the world to come! But He is in administration now at the right hand of God. He is the true Joseph, with the royal ring and the chain of gold, Zaphnath Paaneah — “Prince of the power of the life of the world”, as that title probably means. It is a beautiful title of Christ.
There is progressive presentation of Christ from the third to the fifth chapters of this epistle. He is spoken of as Jesus Christ — the blessed Anointed Man for God’s pleasure; He was that in His life here. Then His death is brought in when He is set forth as a Mercy-seat in the power of His blood. Then we see [p. 76] Him as Jesus our Lord raised from among the dead. And, finally, He is set before us as our Lord Jesus Christ, the exalted One in heaven, the glorious Administrator of all heaven’s grace and blessing. All God’s favour to men is set forth in Him; He is made “to be blessings for ever”, Psalm 21: 6. When the Queen of Sheba saw the administration of Solomon she said, “Blessed be Jehovah thy God, who delighted in thee, to set thee on his throne, to be king to Jehovah thy God! Because thy God loved Israel, to establish them for ever, therefore did he make thee king over them, to do judgment and justice”, 2 Chronicles 9: 8. If Solomon’s administration was such an expression of God’s favour to Israel, what shall we say of the glorious administration of Christ, of which that was but a figure?
The character of His administration is that it brings into peace towards God, and into the sunshine of divine favour, all who come under it. Paul writes as one who was consciously under the shining of that administration — consciously in the wealth and bounty of it — and he links all believers with himself as having common participation in its blessedness. He says, “By whom we have also access by faith into this favour in which we stand”. The access is “obtained and possessed” (see note to New Translation). It is not merely that the wealth and bounty are there, but faith realises need, and avails itself of the administration. The hungry people in Egypt had to go to Joseph, and they got their need fully met, and the result of his administration was that they were brought to be absolutely Pharaoh’s; their money first, then their cattle, and finally their land and persons (Genesis 47), and this is in figure what the administration [p. 77] of the Lord Jesus Christ brings about. Under the powerful influence of divine grace and bounty, and divine compassion, ministered through Him, men come absolutely under the blessed sway of God — they become bondmen to God.
The Lord Jesus Christ is like the golden sceptre which King Ahasuerus held out to Esther. He is the expression of God’s favour to men, and Romans 5 is faith touching the golden sceptre. We see how favourable God is to us as we consider the Lord Jesus Christ. God has placed the Lord Jesus Christ at His right hand in heaven, and put all the wealth of grace and blessing into His hand, so that we may know how favourable He is to us — that we may stand in a sense of it. I am not referring, for the moment, to our place of acceptance in Christ — that would be more our place Godward — but to the sense of infinite favourableness on God’s part to usward into which we have access through our Lord Jesus Christ. Ephesians 1: 7 is that we are graced in the Beloved; that involves sonship; it is the place of favour in which we are set before the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. But in Romans 5 we have access into a sense of the great favour of God to usward. We are justified, have peace towards God, and we have access into God’s infinite favourableness towards us, through our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Lord Jesus Christ in heaven sheds forth all the light of divine favour for faith to have access into. I have known a Christian regard a good stroke of business as a mark of God’s favour! But if that favour were known through circumstances, Paul never had it, for he lost everything for Christ, and had a life of misery. He tells us that “if in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are the most miserable of all men”, 1 Corinthians 15: 19. No, the favourableness of God to men shines not in circumstances here, but in the face of the Mediator. One is thankful for the mercy of food and raiment, and all that bears witness to God’s consideration and care in the circumstances of the pathway here, but the true portion of the believer is the favour of God known through the Lord Jesus Christ, and it is outside and apart from all circumstances here.
What a place the believer has through the Lord Jesus Christ! He is justified, and has peace towards God, and access into ineffable favour. It is the glory of grace shining in the Saviour’s face. 2 Corinthians 3 develops it further. The glory of the Lord is that He is the Mediator of the new covenant; all that God is in His favourableness to men shines forth in Him; it is according to His glory, and who can measure that? Now it is for faith to touch the Sceptre, to have access into the favour of God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and to stand in it.
Then “we boast in hope of the glory of God”. From the days of the tower of Babel this world has been the scene of the glory of man, but from those days God has presented another world to faith. He called Abraham out, and told him that he should be the father of a multitude of nations, and that kings should come out of him; and He told him, too, that He would introduce a city which had foundations, “of which God is the artificer and constructor”, Hebrews 11: 10. That city, as we know, has the glory of God; Revelation 21: 10. So that from the days of Abraham it has been faith’s portion to look for a coming world in which will be a multitude of nations and kings, the offspring of Abraham through God’s covenant, where [p. 79] all will walk in the light of that heavenly city which has the glory of God. The promise was to Abraham, and to his seed, “that he should be heir of the world”, Romans 4: 13. But when faith inherits the world, it will not be a world of ambition, covetousness, pride, and man’s vain glory, like the present world, but it will be a world where all is the product of God’s working according to His covenant, and in which His glory will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.
As we learn to know God through the glad tidings we see what constitutes the glory of God, and we boast in hope of that glory, as about to break forth and irradiate the whole scene where lawlessness and death have reigned so long. God’s world will come into view at the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, and it will be filled with His glory. The better we know God, the greater sense shall we have of the blessedness of that coming day when His glory will shine forth under the administration of our Lord Jesus Christ. Notice that little word “our”. It suggests that on our part we have already given Him His place. Though still disallowed and rejected by men generally, we have accorded Him His rights; we have, as it mere, claimed Him as ours. He has become Lord to us, and that very fact, now openly confessed by us, separates us from the world that still disowns Him. And we boast in hope of the glory of God. To do so ensures our deliverance from the vain glory of this present world: it sets us apart from its pleasures and its politics.
“And not only that, but we also boast in tribulations, knowing that tribulation works endurance”. Saints realise that the present course of things is not marked by righteousness or peace; it is not under the administration of our Lord Jesus Christ; and hence we expect to find pressures. Those who recognise the principles of God’s world, and seek to be in accord with them, find that this means pressures here; the present time is marked by sufferings. Paul did not hesitate to tell young converts that “through many tribulations we must enter into the kingdom of God” (Acts 14: 22); and the Lord said to His disciples, “In the world ye have tribulation”, John 16: 33. Three things are linked together by John: “The tribulation and kingdom and endurance”, Revelation 1: 9; the one article puts the three things together. The present character of the kingdom involves tribulation and endurance, but we have companionship there. John speaks of himself as “your brother and fellow-partaker in the tribulation and kingdom and patience, in Jesus”. All who are set for the kingdom of God participate in tribulation.
Now what is the attitude of our souls towards tribulations? Naturally we shrink from them, and would avoid them if possible; we would wish to be relieved of pressures. But spiritually we boast in tribulations. The believer who has peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and who is standing in a blessed sense of how favourable God is to him, has the inward conviction that tribulation is a spiritual advantage; it works endurance. This is not something which we are told: the word “knowing” here is the word for conscious knowledge; it suggests ability in the soul to take account of how things work experimentally. I do not think anyone will “boast” in tribulations until he has found them to be spiritually advantageous. Tribulation, or pressure, gone through with God has the effect of developing a precious quality [p. 81] of Christ in the saints. Having regard to the present condition of things, endurance is a most valuable quality. It is said of the Lord Jesus that He “endured the cross, having despised the shame”, and that He “endured so great contradiction from sinners against himself”, Hebrews 12: 2, 3.
This quality of endurance is now being worked in the saints; it fills up the interval between our first getting the light of the kingdom of God and that kingdom being publicly manifested. It is now a question of holding on steadily in the light of the Lord Jesus Christ in heaven, and of the coming glory, expecting that there will be pressures here, but inwardly assured that they are working endurance. They are bringing out the staying power that is resident in the one who has peace towards God, and who stands in divine favour. The ability is developed in the circumstances where it is needed, in the light of other circumstances where it will not be needed. Even as to the Lord it was “in view of the joy lying before him” that He endured. He went steadily through everything, and He says to us, “In the world ye have tribulation; but be of good courage: I have overcome the world”, John 16: 33.
It is a great help to saints under pressure when they are able to dissociate themselves from natural thoughts, and to look at things according to the conscious knowledge which they have of the favourable working of these things. Without tribulation we could never acquire endurance. I suppose we have all had occasion to witness the development of this quality in suffering saints. It brings out the strength of the justified man, the strength which comes into the soul through the knowledge of the favour of God.
“[p. 82] Only in Jehovah, shall one say, have I righteousness and strength” (Isaiah 45: 24): the two things go together.
Thus endurance works experience. The saints are put to the proof, but — having endured — they are approved, That this is the force of the word here translated “experience” may be gathered from the other five passages where it is used (2 Corinthians 2: 9; chapter 8: 2; chapter 9: 13; chapter 13: 3; Philippians 2: 22). It is as we are able to bear pressures, and endure, that the genuineness of the work of God in our souls is proved; things become experimental with us. This cannot be acquired by ministry or reading; it is the wrought product of endurance. Paul knew what he was talking about; it was not all ideas and theory with him.
And experience works hope. One learns to look outside the present scene, marked by tribulations and endurance, to that future world of glory where all will be in accord with the mind and heart of God. It is most important that hope should be wrought in the souls of believers; it brings in the brightness of the coming day. Peter would lead us to conclude that hope is to be so manifestly characteristic of the saints that it causes people to ask questions! “Be always prepared to give an answer to every one that asks you to give an account of the hope that is in you”, 1 Peter 3: 15. This suggests that there would be such a brightness of hope about the Christian that it would have to be accounted for to men of the world. How happy would it be if people saw such evidence of hope in us that they questioned us about it! Hope makes what is still future a present reality. All that is connected with God’s world, as to its public display, is a matter of hope. But it is hope that does not [p. 83] make ashamed. The hopes that men entertain as to the future of things in the world make ashamed, because they are doomed to disappointment. The Christian has not his portion in this world, nor can he produce tangible evidence of the favour of God. He is subject to be taunted that he has no advantage over others; it may appear sometimes that in God’s providence he is less benefited, or even more afflicted, than other men. He has his portion in an unseen and future world, and he is not ashamed to have his hope centred there, because he has something of the most wonderful character to go on with now — something of which the men of the world know nothing, and of which he can give them no material evidence. “Hope does not make ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”.
Believers have the Holy Spirit given to them. We have seen that the “blessedness” of the justified man is in the Spirit, and the Spirit is the Seal of the righteousness of faith, though the Spirit is not named in chapter 4. I think this might intimate that one might have some of the gain of the Spirit without any definite recognition of His presence. But now, in chapter 5, the Holy Spirit is definitely spoken of as given to believers; He is recognised. It is an important moment in the history of the believer when he recognises the fact that the Holy Spirit has been given to him. This might be at some time subsequent to the gift of the Spirit. In the typical history of Exodus the children of Israel singing the redemption song of chapter 15 represent believers who have the Spirit, but there is no direct type of the Holy Spirit until the water which flowed from the smitten rock in [p. 84] chapter 17. I believe this to represent the time when the believer is brought to the definite recognition of the Spirit as given. And that wondrous Gift is seen to be the result of the smiting of Christ, He has borne the stroke of judgment due to the man that sinned — the man after the flesh — that God might give to us His Holy Spirit to be the Source of spiritual vitality, so that we might have inward divine refreshment in the very scene of tribulations and endurance. And this is recognised now by the believer.
What an amazing fruit of God’s grace, and of redemption accomplished! The Holy Spirit given to us! This is far too great a gift to be the result of anything less than the love of God, and the infinite value of the death of Christ. And this Gift is given that the love of God may be shed abroad in our hearts. It does not satisfy the blessed God that we should know His righteousness, His grace, His power; He would have us to know the very spring of all in His own heart; and this could only be in our hearts by His Holy Spirit being given to us. Only a divine Person could pour out into the hearts of believers the love of God. God would be known in His love in the hearts of men. Nothing could be greater than this.
The Holy Spirit would direct us to the death of Christ as the great and blessed witness of God’s love. In chapter 3 we see how God has been glorified in respect of sin by the blood on the Mercy-seat, so that He can in righteousness be favourable to sinful men. In chapter 4 it is the death of Christ as delivered for our offences, His guilt-bearing. But in the verses now before us that death is seen in the witness which it bears to the love of God. They speak of the penalty [p. 85] of death its borne by One who came under it in the love of God.
The thought of “we being still without strength” is brought in to show the helplessness of man, his inability to move Godward. But God has moved manward in the most wonderful way. His own Anointed One, the precious Object of His choice and delight, has died for the ungodly. It was pure love on God’s part that He should do so. Can we think of all that Christ was to God, in the fragrance and power of what He was as God’s Anointed, without having a sense of what God has given up in love when that Blessed One came under the penalty of death for the ungodly?
Verse 7 brings out the character of surrender which would be involved in one man dying for another. It would be considered amongst men the supreme sacrifice that could be made. A man’s life is very precious to him, and the life of Christ was unspeakably precious to Him and to God. He said, “My God, take me not away in the midst of my days”. The value of His life to God is emphasised in Romans 5: 6 - 8. But He died for the ungodly — for us — and God commends His love to us in that supreme sacrifice, that amazing surrender. The love of God was concentrated in that wondrous act, the death of Christ, but for nearly two thousand years it has been diffused in millions of hearts by the Holy Spirit. God has made the utmost sacrifice possible that we might know His love. The coming in of the penalty of death declared the utter ruin of the creature, but God has made that penalty the eternal witness of His love. The love of God expressed in the death of Christ is the most amazing thing in the universe; it [p. 86] can never be fathomed; and it is now being poured out into the hearts of believers by the Holy Spirit. Think of the greatness of its expression in the death of Christ, and also of the greatness of it being shed abroad by the Holy Spirit given! God’s wondrous thought is that His love should become the life of stir hearts so that it might circulate through our whole moral being, Natural life is in the blood, but the very essence of spiritual life is the love of God known in the heart by the Holy Spirit.
The Lord Jesus Christ is not spoken of in terms in this chapter as the Mediator of the new covenant, but the truth of that Mediatorship underlies the teaching here. The truth is stated here in its great outlines. If a man is going to build a house, the first thing he does is to stake out the ground. Romans is like the staking out of the ground; other epistles give details of the structure. There is room within the great outline of this epistle for all the features of divine grace that are developed in 2 Corinthians, and in other epistles.
Having the love of God shed abroad in our hearts, and having been justified in the power of the blood of Christ, we have a wonderful outlook. That outlook is salvation in two aspects: “We shall be saved by him from wrath”, and “we shall be saved in the power of his life”. Salvation had been mentioned in the introduction to this epistle (chapter 1: 16), but we come to it now for the first time in the teaching of the epistle. Justified persons, knowing the love of God, are assured that they will be saved by Christ from wrath. There is “wrath to come” in a future “day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God”, but believers will be saved from it “by him”. Jesus is, as another scripture expresses it, “our deliverer from the coming wrath”, 1 Thessalonians 1: 10. We shall not be saved from coming wrath merely by the course of events, however blessed those events may be, but by a Person who is pledged in faithfulness to preserve us from every infliction of wrath. It lies in the power of that Person to secure for the saints who compose the assembly complete immunity from all that is coming on the world of the ungodly. They have been already justified in the power of His blood, and Paul says, “Much rather therefore ... we shall be saved by him from wrath”. His personal interest and power are engaged to secure this. Indeed, as we know from 1 Thessalonians 4 and Revelation 3: 10, He will remove the saints of the assembly from the scene where the wrath will fall, before a seal is opened, or a trumpet sounded, or a bowl poured out. But the point here is that it is Himself who does it. Such is His tender interest and faithful love, in regard to the justified, that they will be saved by Him from wrath.
Another aspect of salvation is brought before us in verse 10. This verse contemplates believers as having been reconciled, and adds, “much rather, having been reconciled, we shall be saved in the power of his life”. This brings us to the consideration of a great blessing of the glad tidings which is here presented to us for the first time in the epistle, namely reconciliation. God would have us to know what it is to be reconciled to Him. “Being enemies, we have been reconciled to God through the death of his Son”. This brings before us our condition by nature from a point of view which has not been previously considered in the epistle. We have seen already that [p. 88] men did not think good to have God in their knowledge, they found pleasure in doing evil, they did not fear to break God’s law when they had it, they were universally found guilty before Him, But now we find that there was positive antagonism to God in men. “And you, who once were alienated and enemies in mind by wicked works”, Colossians 1: 21. We have been justified from the offences we were guilty of, but as enemies we have been reconciled. It is in each case something effected by God. Justification clears us from all imputation of guilt, but reconciliation is in regard of the state of enmity and alienation from God which characterised us all by nature. God has taken account of that, as well as of our sins, and He has undertaken to effect reconciliation. He has undertaken to adjust the whole position to His own satisfaction, and He has done it through the death of His Son. We know from Colossians 1 that the Fulness of the Godhead was pleased to dwell in Christ, and to effect reconciliation by Him, “in the body of his flesh through death”. This is a statement of wondrous character, such as cab hardly be found elsewhere, or in relation to any other subject. The Fulness of the Godhead — the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit — has undertaken this great work. It has been effected by the Son of the Father’s love: “we have been reconciled to God through the death of his Son”. God would magnify before our hearts the wondrous value and effect of that death. Reconciliation is not something effected by us, for it contemplates us as “being enemies”. Nor is it effected in us, for it is “through the death of his Son”. It is the delight of God to have us suitable to Himself, and in nearness, “through the death of his Son”. The [p. 89] whole state of enmity has been removed through that death; believers are set apart from all cause of disapproval on God’s part, from every feature of unsuitability to Him, so that we might have a place with God which is the answer to “the death of his Son”. The whole condition of enmity which was before God has been taken up by One who knew every necessity of divine love — for it was “his Son” — and He died to secure that we should be reconciled. The reconciliation is absolute and immeasurable and is to be received by faith.
It has often been pointed out that reconciliation is only spoken of in epistles addressed to Gentiles, and it seems to correspond in great measure with what is spoken of to Jewish believers as sanctification. “By which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all... For by one offering he has perfected in perpetuity the sanctified”, Hebrews 10: 10, 14. “Wherefore also Jesus, that he might sanctify the people by his own blood, suffered without the gate”, Hebrews 13: 12. Believers are set apart to have a place with God according to the value of the death of Christ, which puts everything on a new footing, and adjusts everything to God’s satisfaction. God has made up the breach — or removed the distance, as it has been said — to His own satisfaction. We could only be with God for His pleasure “through the death of his Son”, in which the whole state of enmity was dealt with, and through which things are on an entirely new footing — distance, alienation, and unsuitability all removed. We are reconciled in view of being presented “holy and unblamable and irreproachable” (Colossians 1: 22) before the Fulness of the Godhead.
The death of God’s Son ensures the effectuation of divine pleasure.
“Having been now justified ... we have been reconciled to God”. These are positive statements — true of God’s called saints who have obeyed the glad tidings — and they must be taken in their own fulness. God has justified us, and He has reconciled us. We contributed nothing to either of these two great blessings. How it magnifies God before our adoring hearts! He has shone out through our Lord Jesus Christ in the effulgence of what He is in grace, and in such a way that faith can boast in God. Not merely in this or that blessing, but in God the Source of all.
“Much rather, having been reconciled, we shall be saved in the power of his life”. What an outlook is here! Saved in the power of the life of the Son of God! He lives to the eternal pleasure of God. “The Son of God, Jesus Christ ... did not become yea and nay, but yea is in him”, 2 Corinthians 1: 19. The substantiation of all the pleasure of God is in His Son, and to be saved in the power of His life would involve deliverance from everything that would hinder us from living to the pleasure of God. I feel how little I know of the reality of it, but I appreciate and delight in the thought of it. This is the outlook before believers; God would not propose anything less to us than being saved in the power of His life. It says, “we shall be saved”; God would have us to look for it, to expect it all the way through. What God had in His mind in sending forth His Son was that sonship might be brought in, and the Son of God lives to save us from everything that is unsuitable to sons of God. If we have been reconciled through the death of His Son, “much rather, having been reconciled, we shall be saved in the power of his life”. Who can measure the extent of this? I think it includes all that is the fruit of the priestly intercession of Christ, for it is as the Son of God that He is “a priest for ever according to the order of Melchisedec”. “Whence also he is able to save completely those who approach by him to God, always living to intercede for them”, Hebrews 5: 5, 6; chapter 7: 25. He is sympathetic with infirmity, and succours His saints in all their weakness here, and He can sustain them above every pressure so that they may be free in spirit to enjoy the privileges connected with the divine calling. Indeed, to be saved in the power of the life of the Son of God would be to be completely freed from every carnal, legal, or natural influence so as to be entirely for the pleasure of God. Paul walked in the good of that salvation; he could say, “But in that I now live in flesh, I live by faith, the faith of the Son of God, who has loved me and given himself for me”, Galatians 2: 20. There is complete provision in Him. We may have known little of it as yet, but God would encourage us as to what we may look for in the path we have entered on as reconciled to Him. It, is a path in which we may confidently look for salvation from every phase of the enemy’s power which we may have to encounter, and from every feature of weakness in ourselves. What a triumphant outlook! “We shall be saved in the power of his life”.
Thus we come to a wonderful climax. “And not only that, but we are making our boast in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom now we have received the reconciliation”. This is new [p. 92] covenant blessing, entered into through the Mediator. It is what God is for men, known to believers, so that they make their boast in Him. “I will be their God ... for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith Jehovah”, Jeremiah 31: 33, 34. The Mediatorship of the Lord Jesus Christ — the administration of divine grace through Him — is wondrous. There is the full light of divine glory shining without a veil in Him, and it is all infinitely favourable to men. Every ray of that glory becomes a ground of holy boasting to the believer; there is absolute stability in it, absolute blessedness. Joseph could say, “Tell my father of all my glory in Egypt, and of all that ye have seen”, Genesis 45: 13. Joseph’s glory in Egypt was typical of the glorious administration of the Lord Jesus Christ. How subduing is the sense of His greatness! Under His administration we come into peace, favour, the gift of the Spirit, the love of God, reconciliation, and are able to make our boast in God.
Nothing can dim the shining of the light of God revealed in grace. Unbelief may shut it out of man’s heart, but nothing can dim the shining; it is radiant in our Lord Jesus Christ. And through Him we have received the reconciliation; we have received it through the ministry of it under the administration of our Lord Jesus Christ. We take in the thought of God’s delight to have us suitable to Himself and in nearness; we are on that ground with Him. It is the divine result of God coming out to put things on a footing that is agreeable to Himself.
These two great subjects of reconciliation and the knowledge of God in the love revealed in the new covenant are continuously brought before us in the Lord’s supper. “This is my body, which is for you”, ever speaks to us of the fact that we are on the footing of Christ’s body having been given for us in death. And “This cup is the new covenant in my blood” brings in the wondrous way in which God is known to us. It is to be noticed that in connection with the cup the Lord refers to the frequency of the remembrance: “as often as ye shall drink it”. How pleasurable it was to Him to contemplate the frequent recurrence of the saints doing that which brings the love of God before them!
What an impression the disciples must have had — after they received the Holy Spirit — of how God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing trespasses! In the Gospels we see how God has come out to men in a Man, according to what He is in Himself and according to Christ, and that He delighted to be known as having thus come out. Who can measure the greatness of any single incident in the Gospels? His saints and servants have been delighting in, and speaking of, the seventh, tenth, and fifteenth chapters of Luke for nearly two thousand years, but they can never fathom the depths that are there! At the present moment God is having to say to men on the footing of Christ and His death. It is not a time of condemnation but of reconciliation. But if men do not receive the reconciliation they will inevitably perish.
We learn Christ first as the Administrator of divine grace, the Mediator between God and men. It is of great importance to be established in the knowledge of God as made known to us in grace through our [p. 94] Lord Jesus Christ. We are then prepared to learn Him as the divinely appointed Head, who holds a place in relation to men of which Adam is the figure. Up to this point in the epistle the great subject has been the presentation of God to us through the Lord Jesus. But now our attention is called to the illustrious place which Christ holds as the one Man. Adam is the figure of Him, but He is infinitely greater than Adam, and the place and blessing which come in by Him far exceed the evil which came in by Adam. We are all familiar with the evil; we have to learn the blessing by grace.
The consideration of Adam helps us to apprehend the place which Christ has as a Fountain Head from whom flows a mighty and far-reaching stream of divine beneficence and favour. We are all witnesses of how much can come in by one man. The principle of lawlessness entered into the world by one man — the principle of the creature doing its own will. It might seem a very little thing to disobey God in one small act, but it introduced a principle which was destructive of all the relations that rightly subsisted between the creature and the Creator. And the introduction of that principle has affected everybody in the world. It resulted in all those who derived their being naturally from that one man carrying on the principle which he introduced. They all sinned, and death passed upon all men.
There was one offence, but it had tremendous consequences; it had its bearing towards all men to condemnation. It was said lately that a clever man had discovered the death germ! The principle of lawlessness is the true death germ, and it has shown itself to be capable of multiplying to a terrible extent.
[p. 95] It has infected all men with its deadly virus, We all have to acknowledge that we have been infected by that principle; it has worked in every one of us.
Now God has considered the introduction of that principle, and all its effects, and He has moved in grace to bring in something of an altogether different character, that in the very scene where evil has come in and been so widespread good might come in and triumph. He has introduced another One Man in whom the principles of obedience and righteousness have come in in such a way that all men can get the benefit of them. Everything that came in by the first man has been taken into account by God. He has given attention to the deadly principle introduced by the one man Adam, and to its workings in all that man’s race, and He has met it by bringing in life on the line of obedience and righteousness by the one Man Jesus Christ.
The blessed and far-reaching consequences of the coming in of Christ are towards all men, and they are known in vital power by those who receive the abundance of grace, and of the free gift of righteousness. There has been one great act of righteousness accomplished by One Man, and it is towards all men. Its bearing is as wide as that of Adam’s one offence. That was towards all men to condemnation; this is towards all men for justification of life. The scripture was quoted in chapter 1, “But the just shall live by faith”. One begins to live morally in relation to God as having the consciousness of being justified. The condemnation is the sentence of death which has passed upon all men, but justification of life is that men may be cleared of every charge so as to live in righteous relation to God. The one great act of [p. 96] righteousness, accomplished by Jesus Christ, is so wide in its bearing that it makes possible that all men should be delivered from the death penalty, and should live as justified. Instead of being condemned, they may live in relation to God as justified persons.
The thought of life is brought in here for the first time in the epistle. We read of some who “reign in life”, then “justification of life”, and, finally, in the last verse of the chapter, “eternal life”. Indeed this chapter indicates to us the entrance of the way of life. Just as sin and death go together, so do righteousness and life, and the two latter are bound up with “the one man Jesus Christ”. Through the one righteousness God can relieve men of condemnation so that they may live in relation to God as justified. The one righteousness is greater than the one offence by so much as Christ is greater than Adam. The only Head now is Christ. The one great act which has its results now towards all men is that act of righteousness accomplished by Christ when He died and bore the judgment of sin. He has maintained all that was due to God in relation to what came in by the first one man. God would magnify before our hearts that one great act of righteousness, because in doing so He magnifies the Person who accomplished it, and His own favour and grace, which were expressed in that Person and by that act.
God has brought in a Head for men who is in perfect accord with all His own thoughts. Christ is morally entitled to take the pre-eminent place with all men, for He has brought in righteousness and life, and no other man could ever do that. There have been great men in the world, but not one of them has ever had the renown of bringing in righteousness and life;
[p. 97] they have got ascendency on quite different grounds from these. They could not even secure righteousness and life for themselves, for they were all sinful men and under death. But what a contrast in God’s one Man!
Verses 13 - 17 are a parenthesis. Sin was in the world long before the law, but it was not put to account, for there was no breaking of a definite rule laid down by God. After the law was given sin became positive disobedience which God took account of. But death reigned from Adam to Moses; the many who stood in relation to Adam died, though they had not, like him, transgressed a positive command.
Now there is an act of favour on God’s part. Will it also have a wide bearing? Is there to be an extended effect from an offence on the part of the creature, and no extended effect from a great act of favour on the part of God? To suppose such a thing would be to imply that the evil of the creature is more powerful and effective than the good that is in the blessed God. If evil has widespread effects — and none can deny this — much rather shall the grace of God, and the free gift in grace! Paul puts the question, “Shall not?” It is as much as to say, After what you know of God, are you not sure that if He brings in an act of favour, His grace and free gift, it must abound over the effect of evil, it must go out to many?
All turns now on the one Man Jesus Christ, and the immensity of what God has brought in by Him. Certain penal consequences reached many by the offence of one, but now it is “the gift”, “the act of favour”, “the free gift in grace”. It is the beneficence [p. 98] of the heart of God going out to His creature. How could it be less in its scope than the creature’s sin? Paul varies the terms he uses to bring out the marvellous character of the grace of God by the One Man. All this is Paul’s glad tidings. God is glorifying Himself now in the way of grace, and doing it on principles that have stability, viz., obedience and righteousness. We have seen that an innocent order of things can be morally corrupted and overturned; but a system of blessing founded on obedience and righteousness cannot be overturned. No power of evil can touch what is founded on Christ; and, blessed be God, the principles introduced in Christ have now begun to operate vitally in all God’s called ones. The principle of obedience is in their hearts, for they have received the glad tidings by “obedience of faith”. Peter speaks of the saints as “children of obedience”; they are begotten of that principle. And the principle of righteousness is there also, for they have repented and judged themselves. The second “many” in verses 15 and 19 are those called of God.
Through what one person did, judgment came in and condemnation, but “the act of favour” regarded many offences only with a view to justification. What an “act of favour”! That “act of favour” is the bringing in of God’s One Man, and all that has been accomplished by Him on God’s behalf for men.
There is “abundance of grace, and of the free gift of righteousness”. It is now a question of what is in the One Man Jesus Christ, and, on our part, of receiving. Man is simply the receiver, but it is such a receiving as secures the blessed result that those who do so “reign in life by the one Jesus Christ”. This [p. 99] is the wonderful result of receiving what comes from God through His One Man. The saints are set in the supremacy of life, made to be dominant over all the evil that is here, they are made overcomers. If I carry out my own will, that is degradation; it is not reigning in life. If I yield to movements of the flesh, that is not reigning in life. We see how death reigns; how universal is that reign; it thoroughly subdues the will and pride of man; it brings everything down. Now the saints are to reign in a power of life that is superior to all the influences of lawlessness. That is the effect of really giving the One Man Jesus Christ His place, and the principles which God has introduced in Him. It transfers us into an entirely new system morally. We have seen a deadly principle brought in by one man, and great principles of life brought in by Another, and we have been transferred by infinite grace from Adam to Christ.
Notice the word “shall” in verse 17. It is not spoken of exactly as realised, but as the blessed end proposed by grace. The realisation of it involves the deliverance which is unfolded in chapters 6, 7, and 8. It does not say that every believer does reign in life, but the end which divine grace has in view is that we should do so. Is it not blessed to think of giving such place to the One Man Jesus Christ as to be made superior to all the forces of lawlessness that are here? The One Man is a Fountain Head from whom flows such an abundance of grace that those who receive it reign in life by Him. In the world to come the saints are going to reign with Him; they will be dominant then; but they are to be morally dominant now by Him. James speaks of the “crown of life”, and I think the possession of that crown is [p. 100] anticipated by those who get the gain of vital relation with the One Man Jesus Christ. Instead of being in subjection to the influences of evil, the believer is here set in view of being in supremacy over them. It is a blessed and stimulating outlook to anticipate that, even while here in mortal conditions, we may morally “reign in life by the one Jesus Christ”.
“By the disobedience of the one man the many had been constituted sinners”. The principle of disobedience infected the whole race that stood in relation to the one man by whom it came in; the same principle worked in them, and constituted them sinners. But now another principle has been brought in — that of obedience — and by that principle the many who stand in moral relation to the Obedient One will be constituted righteous. It is as coming under the influence of the principle of obedience as manifested in God’s One Man that we are constituted righteous. This is an advance upon having righteousness reckoned to us; it refers to what God’s called ones become constitutionally. We have come under a Head marked by obedience, for it is not one obedience, but “the obedience of the one”. He was marked by obedience from the beginning to the end — from His coming into the world, saying, “Lo, I come to do thy will”, right on to the last cry, “It is finished”, on the cross. He was the ever-obedient One, and God has brought His called ones under the influence of Christ that they may take character from His obedience and thus be constituted righteous.
Peter tells the elect sojourners of the dispersion that they were sanctified “unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ”. It is to that we are set apart. As having come under that principle [p. 101] we are constituted righteous. But as in relation to reigning in life, so here also, it is not said absolutely that believers are constituted righteous, but “the many will be constituted righteous”. As coming under the influence of the One Man, the principle of obedience begins to work in God’s called ones, and to be, in an ever-increasing measure, characteristic of them, and in this way they are constituted righteous.
Sin has reigned in the power of death; the principle of lawlessness dominating man has brought in death. But grace reigns through righteousness to eternal life. It is through the principle of righteousness being established in the souls of believers that grace reigns to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Righteousness involves self-judgment, and the setting aside practically of our own will. The sway of grace in the soul ever works in this direction, and the blessed end in view is eternal life. It is an end to be reached now, under the present and powerful reign of grace; it is the objective which divine grace has ever in view. Paul usually speaks of eternal life as a goal to be reached, something to be sought and laid hold of, something to be reaped as a result of a certain sowing, the end of a certain course.
These three things — believers reigning in life, being constituted righteous, and grace reigning in them through righteousness to eternal life — show the complete triumph of God in relation to all that had been the ruin of the creature. He has met the reign of death by making it possible for His saints to reign in life; where many have been constituted sinners He has shown that He can bring about that many shall be constituted righteous; and where sin reigned in the power of death He has brought in the reign [p. 102] of grace through righteousness, and eternal life thereby. And He has brought it all about by “the one man Jesus Christ”.