Romans 5:9-10 “And since by his blood he did all this for us as sinners, how much more will he do for us now that he has declared us not guilty? Now he will save us from all of God’s wrath to come. And since, when we were his enemies, we were brought back to God by the death of his Son, what blessings he must have for us now that we are his friends and he is living within us!” Today's episode talks about all Jesus did for us and what that really means for us. He died for us while we were sinners and His sacrifice was enough to cover all of our sins, now and future sins as well. We have been redeemed forever! Music:"Adding the Sun" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
We Were Saved Forever
Romans 5:9-10 “And since by his blood he did all this for us as sinners, how much more will he do for us now that he has declared us not guilty? Now he will save us from all of God’s wrath to come. And since, when we were his enemies, we were brought back to God by the death of his Son, what blessings he must have for us now that we are his friends and he is living within us!”
This is one of those verses that I just can’t seem to believe. It is one I seem to get stuck on and think about often. Well, maybe not as often as I should, but it is one that definitely sticks with me. Jesus died on a cross for us while we were still sinners. He knew all the things we were still going to do and yet He still thought we were worth it. Can you believe that? I can see dying for someone who messed up and yet they were sorry and they were committed to not doing it again. This is not what Jesus did. Jesus knew we were sinners and that we would not change completely and yet He died for us anyway.
This verse begins with, “And since by his blood he did all this for us as sinners, how much more will he do for us now that he has declared us not guilty?” I find this wording interesting. Some of the other translations say we “were reconciled with God” and another says “there is no longer a question that we are at odds with God.” What this verse is saying, no matter which translation we are looking at is that our relationship with God was put right. When Adam and Eve ate of the fruit of good and evil we were banished from Heaven and there was a veil between us and God. When Jesus died on that cross the veil was torn and there is nothing in the way between us and God now.
Well, there can be things getting in the way of your relationship with God but if there are, they are things you are putting there or things you did. Before Jesus died for us, there was original sin, so we were separated from God because of the sin of Adam and Eve. If there is anything getting in the way of us being with God now, it is something we put there. We have no one to blame but ourselves. The only sins affecting our relationship with God are the ones we are committing. This is very different than before.
The beginning of this verse is also telling us to look at how amazingly God treated His people before He sent Jesus down to die for our sins. If God could do all those amazing things for His people before He saved us, just think of how much more He will do for us now. In other words, God saved His people time and time again from trouble, even though they kept turning away from Him, even though they were still paying for the original sin. If this is the case, how much more will He do for those who He has declared innocent. I was looking for a better way to explain this, a way that might make it more clear. I found an article and I will put a link for it in the show notes. This article is titled, “Romans 5:9-10 | Legally Safe, Relationally Near” by David McLemore. (CLICK HERE) for the article. This article said, "Romans 5:9-10 shows us three things about how God saves us:
He has set us free by justification;
He has drawn us near in reconciliation;
He is saving us forever by the life of Christ.”
The first point of the article was that God has set us free by Justification. The way the author described this is to imagine you are in court on trial for something you know you did. The judge is the person you committed the crime against. There is no denying that you did the crime, there is overwhelming evidence and you have no choice other than to plead guilty as everyone knows you are guilty. You plead guilty and you stand there for what feels like forever waiting for the judge to hand over your sentence, which is probably your life. Finally, the judge looks you in the eyes and says, “The penalty has already been paid. You are free to go.” Can you imagine that? Everything you have done and yet you are free to go because someone else paid the penalty. This is what the author meant by we are set free by justification. Jesus paid the price for our sins.
The second point he made was that God has drawn us near in reconciliation. The author points out that the first step was a more legal step. You are legally set free. This next step is a relational step. There is a difference between setting you free and wanting to have a relationship with you. God could have set us free but still kept the barrier up. I mean we did continuously turn away from Him. We do continue to sin over and over again. Can you think of a circumstance where you might forgive and set free and yet want to keep your distance? What about in the case of a divorce? You might forgive that person for leaving, you might realize they weren’t the only one caused the problem, and yet you might want to still keep your distance to protect your heart from being hurt again. I have heard of this a lot in the case of addiction. The person who was hurt is willing to forgive the person with the addiction for all the pain they caused and yet they keep their distance from them.
God did not do this to us, He welcomed us back in with open arms. The article describes it as the judge smiling at you after saying you are free. Then they come down and hug you and lead you back into their chamber. They talk with you, welcome you and support you. It is as if they want to be a part of your life and there is no indication that they will ever leave. It’s almost as if God has adopted you as his own child, which you soon find out, He has. The author states this is what reconciliation feels like. “It feels like the way you felt in the happiest, safest time of your life but infinitely better. It feels as if everything bad is going to be set right. You feel a nearness. It’s nearly inexplicable. Our words just won’t do.” When you have been reconciled with God “You look around you and think through your life and, really, nothing much has changed circumstantially, but everything seems to have changed deep in your heart.”
This brings us to his third point: He is saving us forever by the life of Christ. The author of the article tried to illustrate what the verse means when it says, “ how much more will he do for us now that he has declared us not guilty?” Here is what he says:
“Let me try to illustrate this “much more” of the gospel. Tomorrow comes and we sin again. We are grieved over it and seek to repent and we drag ourselves back into that courtroom. We find the devil there, with the world behind him, condemning us. Yet the scene looks and feels different. We aren’t on trial anymore. Jesus is there before the Father and through the Holy Spirit confirms to our hearts that the blood of Jesus paid for this sin too. We can’t be condemned now, not after all that Jesus has done for us. We are still as free as we were before. Our heart explodes again. We have new power to love God – even deeper this time! Jesus has paid the penalty for us.”
This illustration assures us that Jesus’ sacrifice was enough to pay for all of our sins. This shows us that God is not up there just waiting for us to mess up so He can jump on us and correct us. God has redeemed us and He wants to be with us, have a relationship with us. He does not want anything to get in the way of that relationship. The next paragraph I am going to read just as it is from the article because the author wrote it so well and makes a valid point. He says,
“The hardest thing in the world for God to do was to put us poor sinners back into right relationship with him. It cost Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity his very life. He entered in and lived a perfect life and suffered and died to save us. He has already done the hardest, most complicated thing. Now all he has to do is keep you. What Paul is saying here essentially is, “Since God has already done the hardest thing, why would he not do the easier thing of keeping you? God tore his son to pieces for you, why would he not now give you everything else you need?”
God saved us, not just that one time, each and every time. Through that one selfless act of Jesus, we have been redeemed forever. Each time we sin we have the option of repenting, turning back to God and being forgiven. There is no limit on how many times we can be forgiven. We will be forgiven over and over again as long as we ask God for it. He gave His son for us and now all we need to do is turn to Him and to repent when we mess up, which we will for sure do. God knows this and He loves us anyway, he forgives us anyway.
Dear Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless all those listening to this episode today. Lord, we are sorry we keep turning away and we are so thankful you keep forgiving us. We find it hard to comprehend the love you have for us that you would send your only son to die for us. You are amazing and we love you so much! Please help us to understand the relationship you want to have with us. Put on our hearts whatever it is you would like us to do to have a better relationship with you. We love you so much Lord and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus’ holy name, Amen!
Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. If you would like an autographed copy of my book you can find it on my website walkboldlywithjesus.com or Click Here. If you want to receive my weekly newsletter Click Here. I look forward to meeting you here again tomorrow. Remember, Jesus loves you, and so do I! Have a blessed day!