22. ROMANS CHAPTER 5 VERSES 6-9 - MESSAGES IN ROMANS - HELPLESS AND HOPELESS BUT CHRIST DIED FOR THE UNGODLY – JUSTIFIED BY BLOOD - MESSAGE 22
After those wonderful verses that commence Chapter 5 of Romans and which took us 4 postings, we continue in this remarkable chapter and start from verse 6, and the next 6 verses are – let us use the word FANTASTIC. I want to progress here carefully, a verse at a time.
[A]. HELP, I AM IN THE QUICKSAND
{{Romans 5:6 “While we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly”}}
Christ died for sinners. Yes! Christ died for the ungodly. Yes! But we read He did it “at the right time”. What does this mean ?
What I love so much about this verse is the opening of it – “ While we were still helpless”. If a baby falls out of a cot, what do you do? Do you sit back and think, “Well I hope that baby works out for himself how to get back into the cot, or do you go to the child’s aid?” The answer is too obvious but the application is just as relevant.
Did God say, “Well I will sit back and hope the individual works out how to relieve himself of sin, see if he can make his own way out of the quicksand?” No way, whatever. That would never work. The verse says, “While we were still helpless.” The AV uses “without strength,” and other translations use “powerless” or “weak”, but it seems the best word here is “helpless” as we are utterly incapable of helping ourselves. We are as helpless as that baby on the floor in trying to get back into the cot, when it comes to solving our sin problem.
“Weak” is a bad word in my opinion. Weak means you have some ability, some of you is good, but you are not strong enough in the final run. Before I was saved, I was not weak in righteousness. I had none! I was not weak in goodness. There are none that are good. I was not weak in holiness. I had none. The translation of “weak” in the ESV is not a good choice.
We were yet without strength – one has commented, “The word used here ?s?e??? asthenon is usually applied to those who are sick and feeble, deprived of strength by disease; Matthew 25:38; Luke 10:9; Acts 4:9; Acts 5:15. But it is also used in a moral sense, to denote inability or feebleness with regard to any undertaking or duty.”
Self-reformation does not, and will never work. Because men and women are so sinful, it is like we are made up through and through, of rotted fabric that keep crumbling inside, and we have to be dressed in the finest clothing for a function. We are helpless. Reforming ourselves is like drinking bleach to try to whiten up the decayed and rotting inside that is already crumbling.
Trying to live by the golden rule will not work. Meditation will not work. Ascribing to Buddhism or Bahai as a way of living will not work. Pursuing eastern religions and New Age practices will not work. Nothing will work because we are helpless! In fact, if it was possible, the unconverted person is even worse than helpless.
I heard of a man who went to an alcoholics anonymous meeting because of the addiction to drink, but he said the place was so full of smoke he could hardly breathe. You see if the sin problem is so great and you try to reform it, then you just lean to another area of sinfulness. It will never work. Men and women must reach the point in their lives when they say, “I have had enough! Help, I am sinking in quicksand. Help me!”
When I was typing this, on one occasion I mistyped “helpless” and made it “hopeless”. As I thought about it I decided that is not such a bad word to use here and the following verse suggests that – {{Ephesians 2:12-13 “remember that you were at that time separate from Christ, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, HAVING NO HOPE and without God in the world, but now in Christ Jesus you who formerly were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ”}}
However the whole turn around in that Ephesian passage is the start of verse 13 “BUT”. There was only One who could do anything about our helpless state, and it is not ourselves.
Isaiah describes the man who is like the baby on the floor – {{Isaiah 1:5-6 “Where will you be stricken again as you continue in your rebellion? The whole head is sick and the whole heart is faint. From the sole of the foot even to the head there is nothing sound in it, only bruises, welts, and raw wounds, not pressed out or bandaged, nor softened with oil.”}} and Jeremiah says a similar thing – {{Jeremiah 17:9 “The heart is more deceitful than all else And is desperately sick; Who can understand it?”}}
Self-reformation will never work. We are so hopeless that another must come to our aid and that is what Romans 5:6 says. It was while we were in that state the Lord died for us, the just for the unjust, the whole One for the one rotting in the corruption of sin.
I am the ungodly. I am the helpless one. I am the one who was rotting inside through sin. I was the one who needed help. At that dire time in my existence, Christ died for the ungodly. It is a testimony all of us can have. Once I was lost but now I have been found. Once I was sinking in sin but now Christ saved me and lifted me from the dark waters into His presence.
What a lovely verse this verse 6 is. It is concise but everlasting. Praise the Lord for all He has done for you, because there was not an atom you could do for yourself. It is all of faith, faith in the finished work of Christ on the cross who died for us.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN “AT THE RIGHT TIME”?
When we were so helpless – the right time. When we could do nothing for ourselves – at the right time.
Does that mean at the right time in history for some have said the Roman era was the best gor gospel communication, because of the language through the whole Empire and the roads and travel? Barnes takes that position saying the Empire was at peace.
The first thing we look at is the word “right time”. The AV uses “due time” and most versions choose “right time” with the Holman using “at the appointed moment.” In probability, the Holman is most correct, as the “right time”, “due time”, was that which corresponds with the fullness of time or the appointed time.
So what is the right time, or the appointed time? I think Ellicott comes close when he says [[ “In due time, or in due season. Just at the moment when the forbearance of God (Romans 3:25) had come to an end, His love interposed, through the death of Christ, to save sinners from their merited destruction.” ]]
Bengel’s Gnomen says – [[ “When our powerlessness had reached its highest point, then Christ died, at the time which God had previously determined, and in such a manner, that He died neither too soon nor too late.” ]]
Let us close this verse in summary - Now we wish to develop further the outcomes of the love of God. To God’s glory, it was He who has done everything for us, who initiated every move. We were in a helpless and hopeless state and utterly unable to rise from that quagmire of concreted sin, and it was while we were there in such a lost condition, Christ died in our place; He bore our penalty instead of us. All were ungodly, that is, we all had a total lack of reverence towards God and insulted His piety, but it was while in that very condition, Christ died for us.
[B]. WHO WOULD DARE DIE FOR ANOTHER?
{{Romans 5:7 “for one will hardly die for a righteous man though perhaps for the good man someone would dare even to die.”}}
Paul points out the supposition that a person at random would not willingly die for another. That is hedging on the aspect of sacrifice. To stand in in the place of another and lose one’s life instead of the other is considered a noble thing to do. Paul makes the contrast of righteous and good. It seems hardly a person would die for a righteous man, a man who has external standards of righteousness, I suppose because righteous men in the world are not loved or respected, but a man who is considered good by the world’s standard, some person may be “tempted” to die on his behalf. The word there for good can mean all of this - a man whose characteristic is that of kindness, amiableness, tenderness.
A very famous novel was written by Charles Dickens on this matter – A Tale of Two Cities – where Sydney Carton managed to perform a swap where he went to the guillotine in place of Charles Darney. It was a sad but touching novel.
The purpose of this verse is to prepare the ground for the next few verses where the emphasis turns to the sacrifice by the Lord who held not back, but gave Himself to the death of the cross. Now it is a fact, that for a man considered to be morally upright, and strictly just, within the perceptions of society; a man who does the right thing according to what is expected of him, thereby commanding community respect; very rarely would another consider dying in his place. On the other hand, but as something of a comparison, on the behalf of a good man, that is, one considered a noble and beneficent man who commands society’s affection, a rare and special man, then someone might dare even to die in his place.
Matthew Poole cited this example – [[ “By a good man you must understand one that is very kind and bountiful, or one that is very useful and profitable; that is, a public and common good. Instances may be given of those that have sacrificed their lives for such. Lilloe stepped between the murderer and king Edward his master. Nicholas Ribische lost his life to preserve Prince Maurice at the siege of Pista.” ]]
However, who would be prepared to die for a filthy, despicable creature in society, one who does not fit the “righteous” and “good” above? I dare say no one would and yet that is what Christ did. He died for the ungodly.
From Gill’s Exposition – [[. . . some may be found willing to die; but who will die for the "the wicked and ungodly"; the profligate and abandoned part of the people? Not one, but Christ died for the ungodly: wherefore if instances could be produced of men's dying either for righteous men, or good men, these would not come up to the instance of Christ's dying for men, who were neither righteous nor good.” ]]
[C]. NOW WE HAVE THE REASON FOR THE LEAD IN – VERSE 8
{{Romans 5:8 “but God demonstrates His OWN love toward us, in that WHILE WE WERE YET SINNERS, Christ died for us.”}}
What a wonderful contrast is all that we considered in the two previous verses, to Christ. He died not for good people, for no one is good in the old, unconverted state. He did not die for any with a perceived, high righteousness, or for a world of partly righteous people, for everyone‘s righteousness is no better than filthy, polluted rags. Rather, Christ was prepared to lay down His life in death for absolute sinners, His enemies, vile and God-rejecting people. Who, of this world, would ever contemplate a Saviour prepared to do that! And it was done as a full demonstration, and proof, and the establishment of God’s own love to us wicked sinners. That love surpasses anything the human heart thinks itself capable of in human affection.
“while we were yet sinners.” God did not tell us to fix ourselves up a bit first; to go on a reformation course before he took us up and then did the rest. No way. It was while we were in the lowest state that He intervened for our salvation. It was when we were helpless and hopeless that the Lord came along and showed us His grace.
Grace meant dying for the fallen creation; taking our place; showing us favour we did not deserve. Christ died for us when we were so lost we could not tell the darkness from the darkness, but He led us into the light of redemption.
The verse says, all that is the demonstration of God’s love for us. It was a giving, sacrificial love poured out in a world that was not only lost, but hated God, the Creator. In quite a number of translations the text is rendered as “His own love” rather than “God commends/demonstrates His love.” That would add the personal touch, as every single blessing grace has given to us, originated with the Lord God through His love. No wonder Paul could say elsewhere, “We love Him because He first loved us.” “There was none other good enough to pay the price of sin; He only could unlock the gate of heaven and let us in.”
[D]. THERE IS MORE BLESSING – SAVED FROM WRATH – VERSE 9
{{Romans 5:9 “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be SAVED FROM THE WRATH OF GOD through Him.”}}
A very precious thought is now presented. Paul moves from justification to salvation from the wrath of God. Romans is a book of developments. We begin with the whole world found guilty before God and the wrath of God hanging over the human race; that being the gist of the first three chapters. Then we have an exit from all that explained in chapter 4, which is faith with Abraham being the prime example.
We move to chapter 5 that takes the step into justification and the flow-on attributes of that. We are justified by faith, and this chapter bursts out of the word of God with the great hope of justification. Then we come to 5:9 and have a new term, which is “justified by His blood”. We can only be justified by His blood, IF we have come through the first step, “justified by faith”. Faith is the entry into all the treasures of God and without faith it is impossible to please God.
To understand the blood of Christ we must understand the blood of the Old Testament sacrifices first. There seems no doubt that God instructed Adam in the matter of sacrifice, and it was because of that, Abel brought his sacrifice to the Lord while Cain chose his own way in disobedience, yet the Lord was tolerant with him and did not destroy him for his sacrifice.
God actually performed the first sacrifice, not Abel. {{Genesis 3:21 “The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them.”}} These garments of skin came from sacrifice; almost certainly it was a lamb, an innocent victim whose life was taken in order to cover over what sin had caused.
Later on the truth of sacrifice emerges in the Old Testament and is explained by this verse – {{Hebrews 9:22 “and according to the Law, one may almost say, all things are cleansed with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.”}} That fact was demonstrated right back in Eden and the truth of it remained right through the sacrificial system in the Tabernacle and Temple.
Of course all these Old Testament sacrifices, every one of them, pointed to the coming of Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, and that truth John the Baptist knew very well – {{John 1:29 “The next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, “BEHOLD, THE LAMB OF GOD who takes away the sin of the world!”}}
The purpose of the Old Testament sacrifices was to COVER OVER SIN. They could never eternally remove sin or the consequences of sin. People were accepted on the basis of the sacrifice that covered over sin, waiting for the time when the true Lamb would remove every vestige and stain of sin, not just cover it over, but remove it entirely. That was done by the blood of Christ, spoken of here in verse 9.
We are justified by His blood. Abraham is justified by His blood. All believers of the entire period of human history are saved through His blood, but to use the term Paul uses – “JUSTIFIED BY HIS BLOOD”.
The second part of this verse is a beautiful promise and glorious fact. {{“we shall be saved from the wrath of God through Him.”}}
There is a double application here. The first is that the wrath of God that hangs over every sinner can have no part against the redeemed saint of Christ because He took our sins, and the consequent wrath for those sins, in His own body on the tree, so we are delivered from any part of wrath whatever. That is such a wonderful position to be in, and Paul tells the Romans that very thing.
The reason the statement is in the future tense, is because the wrath of God is coming; there is no doubt of that fact. It is coming on all mankind, but it will have no part on the Christian. The coming wrath is against sinful, unrepentant men and women but Christ has delivered His own people from that wrath, and here it is more clearly – {{1Thessalonians 1:10 “and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is, Jesus who DELIVERS US FROM THE WRATH TO COME.”}}
Paul reminds the Thessalonians they turned to God from worthless idols then tells them they are delivered from the wrath to come. He further informs them the same thing –{{1Thessalonians 5:9 “God has NOT DESTINED US FOR WRATH, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ .”}}
The wrath of God will soon burst upon this world but not before He removes all His own believers because they will have no part in the wrath of God. Then the wrath descends in the Tribulation, and after the first few Tribulation judgements, we read this – {{Revelation 6:15-17 “The kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains, and they said to the mountains and to the rocks, “Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, AND FROM THE WRATH OF THE LAMB for THE GREAT DAY OF THEIR WRATH HAS COME, and who is able to stand?”}}
The Lord has done so much for us. Blessed be His name! We will stop there today and continue from this point next time.
