The result of justification (10): Saved from God’s wrath (Romans 5:9)

The result of justification (10):

Saved from God’s wrath

 

 

“Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him!” (Romans 5:9)

 

 

 

                This is similarities and differences from Romans 5:9 (“Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him!”) and 5:1 (“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ”): (1) Similarities: The first similarity is the same “we” (vv. 1, 9).  Here, “we” refers to we who were still helpless (v. 6), we who were yet sinners (v. 8), and we who were enemies (v. 10), that is “we” of the past before we believed in Jesus.  The “we” of the past refers to the “we,” whose souls were dead, as we were forever punished and forced to go into the fires of hell because our fellowship with God was cut off.  The second similarity is the same ‘having been justified’ (vv. 1, 9).  (2) Differences: Romans 5:1 says we have been justified “by faith”, whereas verse 9 says we have now been justified “by his blood”.  Here, “his blood” refers to the blood of Jesus.  It refers to the blood of the Passover lamb.  It is the blood of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (Jn. 1:29).  This blood of the Lamb of God is the blood of the Passover Lamb (2 Chron. 35:1, 6).  At the time of the Exodus when God sent the 10^th plague, Moses told all the elders of Israel, “Go and take for yourselves lambs according to your families, and slay the Passover lamb” (Exod.12:21).  Here the blood of the Passover lamb refers to the blood of Jesus, the true Passover Lamb that the Word refers to, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.  The blood of this Passover lamb, Jesus, is the blood of the propitiation for our sins (1 Jn. 2:2).  In other words, Jesus, the Passover Lamb, has reconciled us to God through His death on the cross for us (Rom. 5:8, 10).

 

                The blood of Jesus is the powerful blood.  The precious blood of Jesus has amazing power.  The power of the blood of Jesus can wash away all our sins.  It is the blood that justifies sinners who are enemies of God.  It is the blood of Jesus that satisfies all the wrath of God, the blood that forgives all our sins and the blood that justifies us.  After that, the blood of Jesus continues to work in our lives and is the blood of the power that governs our lives and lives.  Here, “blood” refers to life.  Now we are not only justified by the blood of Jesus, that is, by the life of Jesus (Rom. 5:9), but we also have life through the One, Jesus Christ (v. 17) [This “life” is a free gift of God to us, everlasting life in our Lord Jesus Christ (6:23)].  We are no longer spiritually dead who have lost communion with God, but now (5:9) we are reconciled to God (v. 1, cf. vv. 10-11).  Now (v. 9), God has poured out His love into our hearts by the Spirit He has given us (v. 5).  Therefore, we can now call God “Abba, Father” through the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Jesus, who has been sent into our hearts (Gal. 4:6, cf. Rom. 8:15).

 

                The blood of Jesus Christ is the life of Jesus Christ.  The blood of Jesus Christ is the blood of the Passover Lamb, the powerful blood, the blood that justifies sinners who are enemies of God.  Look at Hebrews 9:14 – “How much more, then, will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from acts that lead to death, so that we may serve the living God!”  The Holy Spirit conceived Jesus by the Virgin Mary (Mt. 1:18, 20), and was with Jesus for 33 years on earth, and was also with Jesus when He shed His blood on the cross.  How can we know all the authority/power/work of the blood of Jesus Christ?  This blood atoned for all our sins and set us free from our sins.  Because of His blood, sinners who were destined to eternal punishment were justified (Rom. 5:1, 9).  Through His blood we have peace with God (v. 1).  Through His blood we have had access by faith into this grace in which we stand (v. 2).  The power of His blood is still at work in our lives, allowing us to come before the throne of the holy God.  Through His blood we rejoice in hope of the glory of God (v. 2).  Through His blood we rejoice in our sufferings (v. 3).  For example, in the book of Job, Job, in the midst of calamity/tribulation, rather fell to the ground, worshiped and praised God (Job 1:20-21).  Through His blood, perseverance produces character and character produces to hope (Rom. 5:4).

 

                Romans 5:9b says, “…how much more shall we be saved from God's wrath through him!”  Here, “wrath” refers to the wrath of God.  There are more than 20 references to God's wrath in the Old Testament, and if we add up all of them, it is said to occur 580 times.  There are two occurrences of the word “wrath” in the New Testament in Romans: (1) One is ‘gentle wrath,’ which is the wrath that God has already sent in the past, is coming down now, and will come down in the future.  Look at Romans 1:18 – “The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness.”  (2) Another is ‘the last wrath’, which refers to the wrath that Heavenly Father will bring at the time of the final judgment.  Look at Romans 2:5 – “But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed.”  The “wrath” in Romans 5:9 refers to the final wrath of Romans 2:5, not the wrath of Romans 1:18.  The day when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed in Romans 2:5 is the day of the final judgment, and that final judgment refers to the Great White Throne Judgment.  Look at Revelation 20:12 – “And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the throne, and books were opened.  Another book was opened, which is the book of life.  The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books.”  Who judges?  The Judge of the Last Judgment is God the Father.  Who will be judged? “The dead” (v. 12), that is, all mankind, beginning with Adam, the first man of mankind, will be judged.  How will He judge?  He will see the books that the Lord has written and will judge.  Among these books is our own book for all of us.  Like an autobiography, it will record our past, present, future, all our sins from birth to death.  So we have no choice but to praise the hymn “One Thing I of the Lord Desire.”  The reason is that the only thing we have done, what we are doing now, and what we can do until we die is only sin.  Therefore, we were all sinners who had no choice but to receive the final wrath of God.  But because Jesus shed His precious blood on the cross, we were justified by His blood, and He will save us from the final wrath (Rom. 5:9).  Previously, because we were written in the books (Rev. 20:12), that is, we were not written in the book of life, we had to be thrown into the lake of fire forever (v. 15).  But only through the blood of Jesus Christ on the cross, we are written in another book, the Book of Life (v. 12), that is, only in the Lamb's book of life (21:27).  Thus we can see the holy city of Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God (v. 10), and we will enter the city where the glory of God is (vv. 11, 26, 27).

 

                Romans 5:9 speaks of ‘salvation’.  Here the word ‘salvation’ appears 5 times as a noun and 8 times as a verb in Romans.  An example of a noun is Romans 1:16 – “I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.”  If we look at it 8 times as a verb, it is used once in the past tense and 7 times in the future tense.  Past tense ‘salvation” used to mean that we have already been saved appears only once in Romans.  Look at Romans 8:24 – “For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has?”  We have already been saved by hope through the blood of Jesus Christ.  Future salvation is used to mean that we will be saved in the future, and the future tense “salvation” appears 7 times in Romans.  Look at Romans 5:10 – “For if, when we were God's enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!”  Here, ‘salvation’ refers to the future salvation we will receive in the future, that we will not receive the final wrath from God’s final judgment, but receive the completion of our salvation through the power of the blood of Christ (v. 9).

 

Salvation spoken of in the Bible is in the past, present, and future tenses.

 

(1)   Past salvation:

 

If we believe in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, by the grace of God, we are already saved.  Look at 1 John 5:12-13: “He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.  I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.”  Looking at these words, the Bible clearly states that those who believe in Jesus, the Son of God, have already obtained eternal life (salvation).  Past salvation is that we have already been justified (justification) (Rom. 5:9).

 

(2)   Present salvation:

 

The Bible says, “Work out your salvation” (Phil. 2:12).  Salvation is not something that people can achieve, it is something that God does.  Look at Jonah 2:9 – “…  Salvation comes from the LORD.”  Look at Revelation 7:10 – “And they cried out in a loud voice: “Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.”  Looking at these words, we can clearly see that salvation is something that God accomplishes (gives), and that we, sinners, can never save ourselves by our own effort (good deeds).  But why did the Apostle Paul say to the Philippian church members, “Work out your salvation”? (Phil 2:12)  In order to understand the meaning of this word, we need to understand what “salvation” is.  The word “salvation” in the Old Testament is the Hebrew word “Yeshua,” which means deliverance from sin and dangerous circumstances.  And in the New Testament, the word “salvation” is the Greek word “soteria”, which is written to mean that we will be rescued from the punishment that comes from sin, the power of sin and our sinful life, and live as eternal people of the kingdom of heaven (Internet).  Based on Romans 5:6, 8, 10, what is salvation?  Look at Romans 5:6 – “For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.”  In the light of this verse, salvation means that we who are totally helpless and ungodly, God helped us, through the death of Christ, delivered us from our weakness and made us godly.  Look at Romans 5:8 – “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.”  In light of this verse, salvation means that we who were sinners, God loved us and justified us through His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, dying on the cross for us (v. 9).  This means that salvation, as the Greek word for “salvation” means, has not only delivered us from the punishment of sin, the power of sin, and our sinful life, but also includes the fact that He has justified us.  Look at Romans 5:10 – “For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, having been reconciled, we shall be saved by His life.”  In light of this word, salvation means that God reconciled us to God through the death of His only begotten Son, Jesus, and made us His children.  Present salvation, that is, “Work out your salvation” (Phil. 2:12) can be interpreted as meaning ‘Work out your eternal life.’  The reason I think this is because when I look at the Bible verses that speak of salvation in the future tense, when Jesus comes back to this earth in the future (second coming), He will lead us to the eternal kingdom of heaven and live forever in that kingdom of heaven.  At the same time, if we consider that we have already been saved through faith in Jesus based on 1 John 5:12-1, we who believe in Jesus already have eternal life.  Therefore, whether it is past tense or future salvation, I think that when we understand “salvation” as “eternal life,” we can consistently understand Paul’s words, “Work out your salvation,” in Philippians 2:12.  In other words, the phrase “Work out your salvation” can be interpreted as meaning ‘Work out your eternal life.’  If we apply that word to us, the word “Work out your salvation” can say, ‘You live as those who have eternal life.’  In a word, it is ‘We should live like people of heaven’.

 

            (3) Future salvation:

 

The Bible also says that we will be saved in the future.  Look at Acts 16:31 – “They said, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”  Look at Romans 10:9 – “that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”  If we look at these two Bible verses, they do not say that we have already been saved if we believe in the Lord Jesus.  But they say in the future tense that we will be saved in the future.  And here the future salvation is that when Jesus comes back God will glorify us (Rom 8:30) and lead us to the eternal kingdom of heaven, where we will live forever.  Future salvation refers to our salvation in the future (Rom. 5:9).  In other words, future salvation refers to the completion of salvation.

 

                  The future salvation that Romans 5:9 speaks of (even on the basis of past salvation) is a more certain salvation.  So the Apostle Paul said in Romans 8:30 – “and these whom He predestined, He also called; and these whom He called, He also justified; and these whom He justified, He also glorified.”  Here, “these whom He predestined” refers to those whom God loved and chosen before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1:4).  ‘These whom He called’ means that God made His chosen people whom He loved to believe in Jesus Christ.  “These whom he called, He also justified” means that God justified His chosen people who He loved with blood (life) of Jesus Christ through faith in Jesus Christ.  “He also glorified” refers to the future that will be saved from the final judgment and final wrath in the future.  And the reason why Apostle Paul said in the past tense is that we will be saved (the completion of salvation) with that much certainty.  Look at Ephesians 2:5-6: “even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.”  We have already been saved by the grace of God.  He made us alive together with Christ when we were dead in our trespasses.  It points to our regeneration and resurrection.  ‘And raised us up with Him’ refers to ascension.  Therefore, we are now seated together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.  It means that we have been saved from the final wrath of God.  It means that it is certain that we will receive the completion of salvation and go to heaven.

 

                We are justified by the blood (life) of Jesus Christ (Rom. 5:9).  All our sins have been forgiven and justified, so that we have been reconciled to God and have peace with Him through our Lord Jesus Christ (vv. 1, 10).  Not only that, but we have access to God's most holy place, where we have access to the presence of God and the throne of His grace (v. 2).  And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God (v. 2), and also rejoice in our sufferings (v. 3).  The reason is because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance produces character, and character produces hope (vv. 3-4).  We have come to serve the living God by the power of the blood of Jesus Christ through the eternal Holy Spirit (Heb. 9:14).  Therefore, we have come to serve the Lord with thanksgiving without name and without light.  We must do our best to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ and love our neighbors.  Even though we are in the midst of adversity, difficulties, and suffering like the valley of the shadow of death (Ps. 23:4), we must live a victorious life through the power of the precious blood of Jesus Christ and the power of God's salvation.

 

                We should thank God because we will be saved from the wrath of the final judgment through Jesus Christ.  As those who have already received salvation through the death of Jesus on the cross and who will receive salvation in the future, we must live a life that achieves salvation in the present.  In other words, as those who have already received eternal life, and as people of heaven who will enjoy eternal life in heaven when salvation is completed in the future, we must live like the people of heaven while we live on this earth.  Living like the people of the kingdom of heaven is living in obedience to the twofold commandment of Jesus.  Look at Matthew 22:37-39: “Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”  (1) Past love: When we were saved through faith in Jesus, God not only gave us the Holy Spirit, but He has already poured out His love in our hearts through the Holy Spirit (Rom. 5:5).  (2) Future love: If we enter the kingdom of heaven when we are saved at the second coming of Jesus, the Holy Spirit will cause us to completely obey the twofold commandment of Jesus, the law of heaven, so that we can love God and our neighbor with perfect love.  (3) Present love: The eschatological Holy Spirit dwells in us and is now bearing the fruit of the Spirit, which is love (Gal. 5:22), and enables us to obey the twofold commandment of Jesus.  So we must love by following the Holy Spirit (v. 16).  In other words, we must be led by the Holy Spirit (v. 18) and live by the Spirit (v. 25).  When we do this, our hearts, our families and our churches will become heaven.

 

                We must boast of Jesus and preach the gospel of Jesus.  When the whole world is in crisis due to this corona virus, we must embrace the nations and pray to God to spread the gospel to all people in the world who are in crisis.  Look at Matthew 24:14 – “And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”  Look at Acts 1:8 – “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”