God Commends His Love (Romans 5:8)

Do you think there are any puzzling details in this verse? I will mention one now, although there is another one that I will mention later.

 

I suppose we would expect this verse to read somewhat differently and maybe you have quoted it differently when speaking to other people. We might want to say, ‘God showed his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’

 

But that is not what Paul says. Instead of saying that God showed his love in the past (which he did do, of course), Paul says that God is showing his love for us today, in the present. But what does he do in showing it? He brings our attention to the cross of Jesus and what happened there. In other words, he is commending what happened at Calvary. After saying this for two thousand years, God still wants to say it today. From this point view, this is the main message he has for us in our circumstances.

 

Sometimes, children will ask their parents, ‘How much do you love me?’ The parent might stretch out their arms and say, ‘This much.’ God points to the stretched-out arms of Jesus on the cross and says, ‘I love sinners that much.’

 

Paul’s description of people

Paul says that the cross happened when we were ‘still sinners.’ This is another surprising way of saying things. It would, of course, have been true literally of Paul because he was alive and sinning in some way, probably in Jerusalem where he was studying at the feet of Gamaliel, on the day that Jesus went to the cross. But we did not exist then, so how could Jesus die for unborn people like us who are described as ‘still sinners?’

 

The answer to that question is found in considering how God looks at us. Before our conversion, no matter where we live or when we live, he sees us as being in Adam, he sees us as members of a sinful race, as aligned with the one who was our representative in the garden of Eden. Moreover, when he sees us, he sees everything about us, and he sees this long before we came into existence. In fact, before the universe came into existence, God knew who we would be and what we would be like.

 

So, is there one word that would describe what we were like in his sight? Yes, there is, and it is the word ‘sinner’. We know that it is important to know the meaning of a word before we work out how it is being used. A sinner is someone who falls short of God’s standard because he or she has a nature that does not want to obey those divine commandments, no matter how old he or she is, no matter when he or she lives.

 

This means that although all are sinners, they vary in what kind of sinners they are, and we can see that even in the words ‘we’ and ‘us’ that Paul uses in this verse. What kind of sinner was Paul? He tells us frequently that he assumed as a devout Jew that he could please God by his own religious efforts, and he even used those efforts to engage in the persecution of believers in Jesus. Yet the day came when he discovered that his efforts did not enable him to keep God’s commandments, that he had fallen far short of God’s requirements.

 

In contrast to Jews like Paul who assumed they were superior to others because of their religion, there were Gentiles, and some of them are listed in the last chapter of this letter. They were among the ‘us’ mentioned by Paul here. They had been pagans who had engaged in idolatry, and idolatry at that time included numerous activities that it would not be helpful for us to mention. When they heard the gospel, they discovered that too were sinners. They had lived their lives without God and without any hope. Some of them may have longed for a moral lifestyle, but their best efforts failed. They would have done this because God’s law has been written on their hearts. But their best efforts fell far short of what God required.

 

Of course, those distinctions between Jews and Gentiles and the practices they had in Paul’s day will not be the activities that reveal we have fallen short of God’s standards. We could do a survey of contemporary behaviours and come up with a long list of attitudes and actions that reveal how we fall short of God’s standard. Yet, there is a quicker way of assessing ourselves and that is to ask a straightforward question, which is, In what way does a sinner fail?

 

The answer is that a sinner fails regarding love. As Jesus instructed his listeners on one occasion, the law of God shows us how to love him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength, and our neighbour as ourselves. The law is about love, and the God who gave the law is defined as ‘God is love’, and through refusing his law we fail to love as we should, whether that object is God himself, those people we know, and even ourselves because we deny ourselves of his blessing by resisting his good law.

 

Yet the verse highlights the wonderful fact that, although we fail to love as we should, God did not fail to love. In contrast with us, he acted in a way that revealed his love, ‘that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.’

 

Paul’s description of Christ’s action

The clause ‘Christ died for us’ is an historical fact. On a particular day, at a certain time, Jesus died. Yet while it is important as an historical fact, there is more to Paul’s description.

 

While the death of Jesus is an historical fact, it was not merely an historical accident or unfortunate event. There have been many people who have given their lives for a cause, but they engaged in the cause hoping that they would not die in the process. Soldiers head off to a war, and while they know some will not return, all of them hope they will be among the ones who do. A person may bravely attempt to rescue another person from danger, but he or she hopes that they will both survive, although sometimes sadly they do not. But Jesus did not find himself cornered in a situation from which he could not have escaped. Rather his death was his intention, and it had been so from eternity, from before the creation of the universe.

 

That last comment is a reminder that his death was part of God’s eternal plan of deliverance. Even after Adam fell, it was revealed by God that the process of recovery would involve suffering for the Deliverer in that his heel would be bruised by the serpent he was crushing. The death of Jesus was part of his God-given mission that he fully agreed with and fully contributed to. He was not a reluctant participant in God’s plan.

 

His death was not just part of his experience. It was the priority in his journey through this world. He repeatedly told his disciples that he would die in Jerusalem. Yet his death would not be the end because he would also be raised from the dead, which is a reminder that his death would be an achievement.  There was a great purpose in his death, a purpose of bringing spiritual benefit to sinners, and that he would be there to give it to them.

 

What did Jesus do in his death? He paid the penalty for the sins of his people by enduring the wrath of God that would have been against them if he had not taken their place. It was an incalculable price, only known by the Godhead. Illustrations and pictures are given of it in God’s Word. It pleased the Lord to bruise him, says Isaiah. He would be forsaken, says David. Jesus would become a curse, says Paul. He would be the Lamb of God bearing away the sin of the world, says John.

 

All this was included in the statement that Christ died for us. Yet as he did so, he was achieving a great purpose. Through his death, millions and millions of sinners would experience spiritual life. His death would be the only means of that being their experience. Apart from the death of Jesus, there is no other way for God to bring blessings to us.

 

God’s commendation

This verse by Paul is a reminder that Jesus by his death did not change a reluctant Father from an attitude of hostility. Some people have made that deduction, but it was and is a wrong one to make. It is true that God was against us for our sins, but we have seen that he also provided the way whereby we could be restored to his favour by sending his Son as the Saviour. So we can spend a few minutes thinking briefly about his personal commendation to us, and we can do so through four thoughts.

First, by commending here Paul has in mind the declaration of the gospel, not merely by him or other preachers, but by God himself. Elsewhere, Paul describes his mission in these words: ‘Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God’ (2 Cor. 5:20). We can see in the apostle’s use of the word ‘implore’ how strongly God wants sinners to be reconciled with him.

Second, why does God commend the death of Jesus to us? Various answers can be given to that question. To begin with we can note that he commends to us what Jesus did because he is pleased with all that he did. God loves obedience, but the obedience he loves the most was the obedience displayed by his own Son when he willingly took the place of sinners on the cross. He delighted to perform the will of his Father, and that response pleased the Father. Jesus said on one occasion, ‘For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again’ (John 10:17).

Moreover, God commends the death of Jesus for its uniqueness as a remedy for the greatest problem that God faced. What was to be done with humans who had sinned against him? It would be straightforward to punish them for their sins, and he would be just in doing so. The problem was how could God remain just and save sinners who deserved to be punished. In the gospel, God reveals the only way by which this can happen. His own Son had to take the place of sinners and bear the penalty. It was such a great work that it cannot be bettered. Why would anyone think it could? Through this astonishing death, life eternal is now offered to all sinners.

Further, God commends the death of Jesus because he desires sinners to be saved. We know that there is joy in the presence of the angels when a sinner repents. But there is no other way for a sinner to be saved apart from faith in Jesus. God’s commendation challenges us regarding how we have responded to the gospel. In the gospel he reveals to us what he thinks of the Son of his love. On his ascension to heaven, Jesus was informed by the Father that he would sit at the Father’s right hand, and that during his day of power many would heed the Father’s commendation and enlist in his army. Have we heeded that commendation, that invitation, to receive the blessings that Jesus has procured by his death.

God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. What do we think of his commendation of what Jesus did?