Romans 5:1-11
Many
people live spiritual lives that are filled with uncertainty. Does God accept
me, or doesn’t He? Has God forgiven my sins, or hasn’t He? Will God
keep all His promises to me, or does God’s faithfulness depend on my performance?
For people who live with this uncertainty, the spiritual life is a topsy turvy
roller coaster. In these verses from Romans, Paul presents us with four assurances
that help us live Christian lives that are confident and assured.
Assurance
of Our Future (5:1-2)
Paul
starts by describing how our future looks in light of our experience of “justification”
in Christ. These verses are full of important terms that must be carefully defined.
But chief among these terms are the words “justification” and “grace.”
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Throughout
Romans Paul has been building his case that we are “justified (“set
right”) with God based on what God has done through Jesus’ death and
resurrection. Thus our “justification” with God does not come as a result
of human effort, merit, race, or social status. It comes as a result of God’s
free favor, God’s grace. This merely restates what Paul has been teaching
up to this point in Romans.
But
now Paul speaks of “gaining access” to grace. This realm of grace opens
the door to a whole new reality. This word translated “gained access”
was used by the ancient Greeks to describe sailors who had been at sea for months,
yearning to see land again.1 Back then, before radios, cell
phones, and GPS soft-ware, sailors relied on maps and luck to find their way home.
This phrase “gained access” was used in that context to describe what
happened when sailors finally found dry land and were able to stand on solid ground
once again. What a graphic picture of how the Christian now “stands”
on the solid ground of God’s grace.
This
standing enables us to rejoice in God’s glory. The word “hope”
sets our sights to the future. When we’re right with God, we receive assurance
that our future is secure.
Assurance
in Our Problems (5:3-4)
But
Paul doesn’t linger too long on the future, because he knows that the present
can be very difficult. Often painful problems threaten to crush our hope. Circumstances
like broken relationships, financial ruin, terminal illness, and life changing
failures can shatter our hopes. So Paul shows us the way to find joy, even in
the midst of our present problems. In the midst of painful problems, we have assurance
that God is still working.
Suffering
produces perseverance. Perseverance is like the distance runner who keeps running
despite the cramps until she gets her second wind; it’s the medical student
who retakes the class after she’s failed; it’s the entrepreneur who
starts another business even though his previous business went bankrupt.