Sunday: Justified by Faith
Read Romans 5:1-5. On the lines below summarize Paul’s message. What can you take from that for yourself now?
“Being justified” is literally “having been justified.” The Greek verb represents the action as being completed.
Image © Lars Justinen from GoodSalt.com
We have been declared righteous, or regarded as righteous, not through any deeds of law but through our having accepted Jesus Christ. The perfect life that Jesus lived on this earth, His perfect law-keeping, has been credited to us.
At the same time, all of our sins have been laid on Jesus. God has reckoned that Jesus committed those sins, not us, and that way we can be spared the punishment that we deserve. That punishment fell on Christ for us, in behalf of us, so that we never have to face it ourselves. What more glorious news could there be for the sinner?
The Greek word translated as “glory” in Romans 5:3 is the one translated as “rejoice” in Romans 5:2. If it is translated “rejoice” inRomans 5:3 also (as in some versions), the connection between Romans 5:2 and Romans 5:3 is more clearly seen. Justified people can rejoice in tribulation because they have fixed their faith and trust in Jesus Christ. They have confidence that God will work all things for good. They will consider it an honor to suffer for Christ’s sake. (See 1 Pet. 4:13).
Notice, too, the progression in Romans 5:3-5.
- Patience. The Greek word thus translated as hupomone means “steadfast endurance.” This is the type of endurance that tribulation develops in the one who maintains faith and who does not lose sight of the hope he or she has in Christ, even amid the trials and suffering that can make life so miserable at times.
- Experience. The Greek word thus translated as dokime means literally “the quality of being approved”; hence, “character,” or more specifically, “approved character.” The one who patiently endures trials can develop an approved character.
- Hope. Endurance and approval naturally give rise to hope-the hope found in Jesus and the promise of salvation in Him. As long as we cling to Jesus in faith, repentance, and obedience, we have everything to hope for.
| What is the one thing in all your life that you hope for more than anything else? How can that hope be fulfilled in Jesus? Or can it? If not, are you sure you want to be putting so much hope in it? |
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God promises to give us the desires of our hearts if we choose to let Him. If this means that He will put Righteous desires into our minds, then He will provide fulfillment of all these desires.
If we do not choose to let Him put the desires in, then we are stuck with our unrighteous desires. Do you think He will help us fulfill our unrighteous desires? Why or why not?
He can't or else He would not have been God. If our ways pleases the Lord then He will grant us the desires of our hearts. Having unrighteous thoughts and expecting God to come through on them is one of the most erroneous thinking one could have.
I've heard many people and sadly even more preachers teach the Lord will bless them with the "desires of their heart" like the Lord is a magic jeanie. All material things - things of the world. I believe He's talking about Him being the "desire of our heart" and how He wants to continually bless us with a closer relationship with Him.
So well said, Connie. 🙂
I'd like to take this one step further: As we draw closer to Christ, we desire only what He desires. At that point He will give us "the desires of our heart."
So the way to get the "desires of our heart" is to be truly converted. 🙂
This addresses the issue of preachers who preach the prosperity gospel....like being blessed is having all the material things ones heart desire...
I think as long as we know that God is there for us and who can be against us, we know that if we pray and ask God for his love and mercy, we are going to receive his righteous desires. We have to stay focused in the Word, in our prayers.
Most of us fail to be justified because we din't have faith in Jesus, we don't spend enough time to learn about him and his wonderful love and care about our life. Let's pray that our faith grow bigger day to day so that we can be Justified.
We often have this notion that justification/sanctification/salvation is a state or goal that we arrive at. We argue fairly urgently that we do not earn it by works, but then we say arrive at the saved state by reading, studying, praying etc. I assert that those sort of activities also carry the notion of arriving at the state of salvation by something we do.
The salvation experience is a journey together with someone we enjoy being with. It is not earned by reading the Bible and praying. It is evidence that you are on the journey when you live that salvation. That includes reading and praying but also includes living a saved life full-time. Whatever we do should be done to the glory of God, not in order to be saved but because we are saved.
To illustrate: I make the bed and vacuum the carpets and cook some meals in our house, not to earn my wife's love but because we are in love and I enjoy doing things with and for her.
Faith in Jesus Christ for what He has done for us on the Cross does NOT come from without! God has prescribed how to acquire that faith. By so doing there seems to be an element of "doing". The "doing" is the acceptance of salvation by grace through faith. The elements of studying the Word of God, praying and and spending quality time with God are CRITICAL to maintain the salvation experience .We "do" these not earn salvation but to maintain the salvation relationship. In fact, through these elements we acquire faith.
The Faith of Jesus is what we need. As we walk through life we encounter issues. These are the points at which the Faith of Jesus can enter our lives. We don't get it by trying real hard, but rather by inviting His Holy Spirit to motivate us in the issue to think and to feel according to the perfect Love of God. This requires death to the darkness of selfishness and permission for God's Spirit to motivate us with His Love in His Light instead.
Love, Peace, Joy, Patience, Faith, etc. are fruit of the Holy Spirit when He is allowed to motivate us through any issue. So the Faith of Jesus comes from Jesus' Spirit to us so that we merely have to accept this Spirit to have the "Faith of Jesus" in every issue we meet.
Of course we must be aware of this and be ready by watching and praying always. God only works in us with our permission. The continual question should be, "Am I permitting Him to bear His fruit in my life or am I doing what I do motivated by my own selfishness."
Don, when you say Christ must get our permission in order to work in us; does that mean that he needs no permission to work from outside of us, as when He is attempting to attract or draw us to Himself? Or does He require a permit for that too.
Kenny, I think that God can do anything He wants. He wants our permission to do things involving our will because He wants our uncoerced love. If He pushes His way with us we cannot give this uncoerced love to Him that His Character must allow because He is the source of perfect Love. He cannot do anything motivated by selfishness because He doesn't want to.
Kenny, God made us as free moral agents. Thus He allows us freedom of choice in our spiritual lives. We can choose to accept His salvation or reject it. While we cannot choose our circumstances (and we cannot control God's rule over circumstances), we can choose how to respond to circumstances.
The bottom line is that there can be no true morality without freedom of choice, and there can be no love. Since love is the foundation of God's government, freedom of choice is foundational in God's government. And that is also the reason that Satan still lives. The universe needs to see the sad results of rebellion, so it will be forever safe against another instance of rebellion.
Please carefully read Marcos Torres' post, "Are Adventists Old-Covenant Christians? (Part 6)" for further clarification of Adventist thought on the matter.
Lukwaro, it seems to me that the reason to spend time with the Bible and in prayer is nurture a relationship with Jesus after we have given ourselves to Him. Like any relationship this requires time in communication and time working together. The "communication" is done through prayer and listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit during prayer. It is also done through Bible study, after asking the Holy Spirit to speak to us. Then we work with Christ by relating to others the way He would in our daily life.
When we are receive Christ, we are both justified and sanctified. We cannot be justified without Him. As Maurice Ashton pointed out, after we receive Christ, we serve Him out of love, which results in "good works."
"we also glory in tribulations" Romans 5:3 - it is amazing
I think there is a lot of things I hope for... But the most important one is to be with and to see all my family in heaven one day! Nothing in this planet that I can wish for will last, but my character... Thus, although sometimes it may hurt, I have to accept God's molding of my existence!
Amen Maurice.
There is a statement in Sunday's lesson, 11/5/17 that says "God has reckoned that Jesus committed those sins, not us... how can this be...Jesus was the spotless lamb of God, without Christ's absolutely clean and pure nature, he could not have been our substitute... I don't understand that statement... please shed light.
Olga, that's a very good question: How could the spotless Son of God bear our sins and die in our place? That is the mystery of Christ dying as our Substitute. But the Bible makes clear that it is so..
Paul says it in 2 Cor 5:21
"For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him."
Isaiah says it in Isa 53 in passages such as this:
" Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed."
Christ died the death that we deserve so that we might have the life that He deserves.
Such is the unfathomable love of God!
Yes His love is unfathomable for while we were yet sinners, Romans 5:8 He died for us imagine that!! giving all for the love of every human's soul who believe in Him.
Olga, your question hilights one of the many flaws in the widely held view about what salvation is and how it happens. I too was raised on that view and believed it for years - but when I actually read the bible from cover to cover several times, read the conflict of the ages series completely several times and compared both of these writings with life experiences of people, I too could see that things didn't make sense. The widely held view of salvation misunderstands and misrepresents the nature of God, the nature of law, the nature of sin, the process of atonement/salvation and therefore the nature of justification ... and so on.
As Inge's (above) reference to Isa 53:4 notes, WE esteemed Him (Jesus) stricken, smitten of God ... Esteemed refers to our perception and the wording of this verse implies that this perception is not an accurate perception/assessment - that we mistakenly esteemed one thing when something else is actually the case.
Mistakenly esteeming that Jesus was bearing some kind of 'punishment/death penalty' inflicted by God so that we didn't have to is such a misrepresentation of God's character and nature - but it is a perfect representation of the character and nature of another. Satan has done a very successful character assassination on God.
So the comment in the lesson that "God has reckoned that Jesus committed those sins, not us..." is not truth. The actual truth is a whole different perspective and reveals God in much greater praise and glory!
Yes, the biblical teaching of the substitutionary death of Christ in our behalf has been widely misunderstood, and the sentences referencd in the lesson don't help a lot because they are overly simmplistic.
However, the full Bible record makes clear that God Himself came down to earth as Immanuel, God with us. (Matt 1:23) God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. (2 Cor 5:19) That gives context to the substitutionary death taught from Genesis (Gen 3:15) to Revelation - with Jesus presented as the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. (Rev 13:8)
The Father is not an angry God punishing His Son instead of us. John 3:16 tells us that the Father gave His Son to save us. He was with Jesus and suffered with Him each step of the way. All this so that we might have everlasting life.
The teaching of Christ dying as our Substitute demonstrates the self-giving love of our Creator God. Read Phil 2:5-8, which explains that, although Christ is equal with God, He did not hold on to (grasp) His divine status but voluntarily gave it up to be born as a human baby into a very poor family. And then He lived a life as every human must live, without the advantages of wealth or status in this life. He was hounded by Satan at every turn to tempt Him to think of Himself first (sin), but He lived in total dependence on the Father and served God and humanity through all His life before giving up His life on the cross. Thus He demonstrated the love of God as well as the law of God and how it looks when lived out in humanity. There's much more, of course, and it will continue to be part of our discussion.
The bottom line is that in a way we cannot understand, God became man and lived a holy life and died in our place to draw us to Himself in love. As Ellen White so beautifully put it,
Hi Inge
So I don't misunderstand you, can you enlarge on what you meant by the phrase "died in our place".
Thanks
Olga and Phil, please explain further, I was just delving in but it was cut short. Thanks!