ROMANS 5 (NOTES OF A READING)
ROMANS 5 (NOTES OF A READING)
Rem It is a good way on in the epistle that we have “peace with God”. I suppose a knowledge of divine Persons is necessary for peace.
Ques Did these Roman Christians know it?
CAC The epistle is written that believers might know the great wealth they have in the knowledge of God. It is most important to know divine Persons.
Rem Paul says of these believers in chapter 1: 8 that their “faith is proclaimed in the whole world”, but I suppose they needed educating in these things.
CAC The gospel is so wonderful that none of us have compassed it completely.
Rem The question is, do we know and feel that we are wealthy in the knowledge of God?
CAC You could not think that you were poor in the light of this chapter! It is very wonderful how the apostle brings in one thing after another. It is an orderly unfolding of the gospel. The different elements of it are opened out one after another. It is a question of knowing God. God has come out to make Himself known to us. God is seen as Justifier: so that we are entirely clear for His world. God’s world is soon to be made manifest. He has justified us in view of His own world. We believe on God: “Believing on him who has raised from among the dead Jesus our Lord, who ... has been raised for our justification”. We are justified for that resurrection world where Christ is. Faith has the present gain and joy of it. We are clear of every charge for that world where Jesus our Lord is, and we sit here tonight in that happy consciousness. There is a world of God’s pleasure, where everything is suited to God. Jesus our Lord has passed into that scene. He is a risen Man. He is in perfect [p. 484] suitability to the scene where God has brought Him and He is there in spotless suitability. A risen Man is our justification.
Rem And that world is beyond death.
CAC We are not justified for a world full of sin where the power of death is. It means something to be justified for God’s world. Godward we have the most absolute peace. In regard of all our past history we have peace toward God, cloudless peace. Just as when the Israelites after crossing the Red Sea saw the Egyptians “dead on the sea-shore”: they had no more trouble about them. The justifying grace of God is first known in the mercy-seat. God has set Him forth a mercy-seat (chapter 3: 25) in all the power and value of His blood that we might trust in Him. But it is not only His death, but that He is raised. There is no stain and no reproach on Him. He is raised again for our justification.
Rem The believer is as clear as He is in resurrection.
CAC Yes, and He is not only “raised for our justification” but He is the glorious Administrator of God’s wealth in grace “through our Lord Jesus Christ”. It is served out by Him. There is not only the value of His death and the complete clearance of His resurrection, but peace is served out to us (just as Joseph served out the corn in Egypt) “through our Lord Jesus Christ”. Chapter 3 is His death, chapter 4 is Him risen, but in chapter 5 we get His full title for the first time in the doctrine of the epistle, “our Lord Jesus Christ”. He is the glorified One; nothing less is suitable to the grace of God. No one but a glorified Christ could serve it out, the Son of man glorified.
Ques What as to Ephesians 4: 8, “Wherefore he says, Having ascended up on high, he ... has given gifts to men”?
CAC That is in it, as Psalm 68: 18 says, “Thou hast received gifts in Man, and even for the rebellious, for the dwelling there of Jah Elohim”; that is, that we might know God, the Source of all. Godward there is absolute repose of soul. So many are harassed and perplexed, but it is all inconsistent with the gospel.
Rem The “therefore” of chapter 5: 1 seems to connect this with what has gone before in chapters 3 and 4.
CAC We need to have peace with God and to know His great favourableness towards us before the Spirit is free to shed abroad in our hearts the love of God (verse 5). The heart is ready for it then. We need to be justified and brought into peace and to understand the great favourableness of God toward us first before we can have His love shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit.
Rem The foundation is laid first.
CAC We often try to go on with the building before the foundation is attended to.
Ques Are these steps? “And not only that” (verse 3), “and not only that” (verse 11).
CAC The knowledge of God in grace is being built up in the soul. The object of the epistle is to “establish” us (chapter 1: 11; 16: 25).
Ques Would you connect “this favour” (verse 2) with the burnt-offering (Leviticus 1)?
CAC This favour is on the divine side. The burnt-offering is the ground of acceptance on our side; the man comes with it to be in the acceptance of it. This is the extreme favourableness of how God regards us. Acceptance is how I stand with God, but how God stands with me is greater. He is so favourable to me that His favour to me is set forth in a glorified Man. It is God’s favourableness to us.
Rem “He has taken us into favour in the Beloved” (Ephesians 1: 6).
CAC Ephesians 1 is how we stand with God. This is the great favourableness of God toward us. In Luke 15 the prodigal is in disgrace and the question is, How favourable is the father to him before he gets the robe, the ring and the sandals? That is how he is accepted. But the extreme favourableness of the father to him was made known when he saw the father running and falling on his neck and kissing him. God is so favourable to us that He would empty the wealth of heaven upon us and lavish it upon us. Have we come into it?
“[p. 486] By whom we have also access by faith into this favour in which we stand”. It is set forth “through our Lord Jesus Christ”. Our side follows. It is so important for souls to know the great favourableness of God towards them. It can never be greater and it will never be less. And it is all set forth in a glorified Man. That is the measure of it. It is greater than my place with God. What God is towards me is greater. I have acceptance before God through the same Person.
Rem We are so slow to give God credit for what He is.
CAC We have to come into it, into the access. All this supposes the presence of the Spirit. The Holy Spirit is not mentioned till verse 5, but He is given earlier. In Abraham’s case, circumcision was “seal of the righteousness of faith” (chapter 4: 11), but now the “seal” is the Spirit. If Abraham is our father, what kind of a father is he? If we are brought into blessing with God we cannot go on with the flesh. The Spirit comes in as the power to set aside the flesh. We cannot have the blessing of God and go on with the flesh. The Spirit is suggested in chapter 4, under the surface. God justifies us that He might give us the Spirit, so that we might set aside the flesh and have the love of God shed abroad in our hearts. Chapter 8 unfolds as teaching what we have suggested in chapter 4. In chapter 8 the soul has recognised the Spirit and is learning how to use the Spirit. In chapter 5 the soul has received the Spirit; he has, as it were, a gold-mine on his estate. But what benefit is that to a man if he does not know it and work it? In chapter 8 the soul knows it possesses the gold-mine and it is worked out and used. The particular point at which we receive the Spirit is not told us. But in chapter 5: 5 the Spirit is doing His delightful work, shedding the love of God abroad in our hearts. God would not occupy us with the moment when we received the Spirit, with an experimental point in our own history. The truth is set forth, and where it is received in faith the Spirit is given. God’s desire is to give the Spirit. He has it before Him in the gospel. Each gospel introduces the Lord to us as He who “baptises with the Holy Spirit”. It was His great mission from God firstly to effect redemption and secondly to baptise with the Holy Spirit. God gives the Spirit as soon as ever He can, as soon as the soul turns from self to God, although he may not recognise the Spirit at the time. In Exodus 15 the people are singing; typically they had the Spirit but there is no definite type of the Spirit until chapter 17, the smitten rock and the water. Think of a divine Person come into my heart to pour out in my heart what was moving God in sending His Son! What moved Him? Love. The Spirit is the spring in the soul, a new spring in the soul to bring us into the region of satisfied desire, “springing up into eternal life” (John 4: 14).
Ques As to “eternal life” in John 3 and 4, how do you look at it?
CAC In chapter 3 it is what is before the heart of God. God loved men in view of eternal life, outside of sin and death and Satan’s power. It was in God’s heart to give it. In chapter 4 it is a spring in you, to set your heart in the direction of eternal life. As having done with lusts and pleasures and unsatisfied longings as in the flesh, we can leave our waterpots and taste the blessedness of eternal life. If the heart of God is moving that way, the Spirit is given to move us that way too.
Ques How are we to deal with souls in regard of their having the Spirit?
CAC In dealing with souls, I should like to make sure that they have the faith of the gospel; if so, God has been faithful and has given the Spirit. Now, the question is, are you using the Spirit, recognising Him and working the goldmine?
Rem His presence would occupy you with God: “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which has been given to us”.
Ques Would you say something as to “justification of life” (verse 18)?
CAC This chapter is the gateway of life. We really live [p. 488] in relation to God as justified. The just (or the justified man) lives by faith. It is the first aspect of life. He lives as justified, consciously lives to God as a justified person.
Rem Joseph in making himself known to his brethren first sets them at rest. Jacob had sent them to Egypt to buy corn “in order that we might live, and not die”. Life was in front of them.
Rem It says, “We also boast in tribulations” (verse 3). I do not know that I do!
CAC It is in connection with boasting “in hope of the glory of God” (verse 2). The glory of God is soon going to come into the world. Look around, and on every hand you see God rejected and lawlessness abounding. But the glory of God is going to come into this world where the glory of man has been and, till that comes in, there must be tribulations. “Knowing that tribulation works endurance” is conscious knowledge. We are conscious of the value of it; we could never boast in it previously. It is far better to be under pressure and to be before God and to watch and pray than to be without pressure and get careless. It is a natural tendency with us all to get careless. Endurance is a beautiful quality of Christ. If you cannot endure, what are you worth for God? What good are you if you cannot bear what tries your spirit? People speak crossly to you, you have a pressure, you are insulted and made to suffer; all this works endurance. You can bear it if you turn to God. The Lord endured: “Consider well him who endured so great contradiction from sinners against himself” (Hebrews 12: 3). Moses endured “as seeing him who is invisible” (Hebrews 11: 27). Until the glory of God comes in there will be tribulation and pressure. When you are under pressure you have to turn to God and you find you can bear the very thing you thought you could not bear. “In pressure thou hast enlarged me”. “Tribulation works endurance; and endurance, experience”. Experience is the proving of things. There was an old woman once who had ‘T. & P.’ written against many passages in her Bible. When asked what it meant she said, ‘Tried and Proved’! Experience is the proving of it.
Rem “Before was afflicted, I went astray” (Psalm 119: 67).
CAC That is corrective. “It is good for me that I have been afflicted” (Psalm 119: 71). Christians as such find out that some kind of pressure is very good for them. I have found it out.