Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ (2) through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.  (3) And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance, (4) and perseverance, character; and character, hope.  (5) Now, hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

The letter to the Romans was written by the Apostle Paul.  In earlier chapters of this wonderful letter, Paul has covered the justification of believers through Christ and his saving work.  The beginning word of Chapter 5, Therefore, tells us that the foundation for today’s verses has already been established.  Paul is assuming the reality of justification by faith for himself and his readers.   He is now telling the reader of the blessings/benefits of justification conveyed to the child of God.  Paul’s approach is to show that unsaved, we have been an enemy of God.  Now Paul shows us what we have through Christ.

Paul explains that the believer’s justification is a guarantee of heaven.  It is a source of tremendous blessings in our present life.  And, stunningly, our justification is a lasting thing.   The believer has been found not guilty.  It was something that happened and was completed the moment we believed.  God declared us righteous, never to change His mind.  True faith is a firm conviction and a surrender to that truth.  The believer’s conduct proceeds from that surrender and leads to a genuine changed life.   The true believer will find peace with God – not a state of mind but a relationship outside of ourselves, coming from the finished work of Christ on Calvary.  This life is still a battle but no longer a battle against God.

Paul tells us that the believers standing as children of God is an eternally settled matter.  We get this standing by grace when we believe in Christ and his works and person – by God’s free grace we are justified.  Paul tells us that not only are we to rejoice in this triumph, we are to rejoice in tribulations.   when we are justified we have the innermost presence of the Holy Spirit – and therefore that of Jesus – and that we are not alone.  We are given hope that does not disappoint.  I should repeat that  – the hope that never disappoints.

There are two threats to the assurance of our salvation.  First, that our faith might be fake – the fire of tribulation is a gift from God to prove us (test us) and show that we are real.  Second, the object of our faith might be fake – God’s remedy for this threat is His love in our hearts.  What matters here only is God’s love for us, not our love for God.   Hope is the desire for future good with the confident expectation of getting that future good.  Hope as used here by the Apostle Paul means certainty – it is sure, steadfast.

The truth of Romans, Chapter 5, is that God gives assurance to the Christian believer through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  I find today’s verses breathtaking – that if we are born again and have faith in the person and works of Jesus Christ, we are guaranteed heaven.  I just sit back in wonder at this doctrine that Paul writes of in the magnificent letter to the Romans.

So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

(9) But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you.  Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.  (10) And if Christ is in you, the body is dead because of sin, but the Spirit is life because of righteousness.  (11) But if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

(12) Therefore, brethren, we are debtors – not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh.  (13) For if you live according to the flesh you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.  (14) For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God.  (15) For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the spirit of adoption by whom we cry out “Abba, Father.”  (16) The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God,  and if children, then heirs – heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him,  that we may also be glorified together.

The Apostle Paul wrote this letter to the Christian church at Rome in preparation for his intended visit.  This letter is an exposition of the gospel that Paul had been preaching for 20 years.   This epistle is a towering letter of theological principles and great truths set forth for the early church and, as Scripture, is the word of God to us.

The verses we study today concern the fallen nature of man and the bondage that man inherited from the sin of Adam.   The wages of sin is death and unregenerate man in his sinful nature was unable to please God.  All this changed with the acceptable sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the Son of God and also made man.  He was without sin and became the perfect acceptable  redemptive sacrifice in atonement for the sin of man. 

The very clear text  tells us that fallen man, redeemed by Christ gives the believing, faithful man new life by the grace of God.  The first activity of our new life is faith in Christ and acceptance of God’s gift of eternal life because  as carnal beings we face physical death, spiritual death and eternal death.

Paul then addresses the reader indicating he is now talking to believers -Those whose spirit is alive because Christ lives in them and thus the righteousness of God is imputed to them – they have the life of the spirit.By grace through faith in Christ, we are acceptable to God.  We are justified even though our believer’s body is mortal.  Paul contrasted eternal spiritual life to death of the body.   As redeemed sinners the Holy Spirit lives continually in us.  Paul modified the belief of the Jews that God would raise the dead at the end of this age but he says God has already raised Jesus and this is a sure sign of the future resurrection of the believer.

the effect of the Holy Spirit  living within us is we are now children of God.  The Apostle Paul is teaching privilege with responsibility.    He now tells us how the privileged should live their lives.  Paul begins with But – recipients are not able to act independently.  It is by the Spirit they are being led.  Salvation is God’s gift from start to finish but there is still is an obligation to perform.  There is always the thread that believers by themselves would never be able to fulfill God’s commands – We acknowledge our empowerment only by the in dwelling Spirit and the love of Christ.  We are no longer debtors to the flesh but to Christ and the Spirit.

Spiritual death results in the separation of the soul from God and equates with the loss of eternal life.   Paul is telling us that believers are no longer under condemnation – but God expects moral commitment and personal effort.    Faith is the key to this.  Grace changes the nature of man but nothing can change the nature of sin  It can be destroyed but never cured.   In reading Chapter 8 of Romans we must keep these verses in context, “There is no condemnation for those who are in Jesus Christ”.  If we slip and fall there is no sentence of eternal death. Instead Paul contrasts different lifestyles – the one of Adam and our fallen, sinful nature -that of death – to those believers in Christ.

When we trust in Christ we are superior to the ways of our sinful nature.    Those who are led by the Spirit are sons of God.  This does not mean we are involved in a new bondage like the law where men were moved by fear rather than by faith.  Those being led are progressively sanctified – set apart from the world and becoming holy.

We have been bought from death into a new life. Christ is the pivot in this new life. God raised Jesus from the dead and the believer with Him – triumph is assured if we live after the Christian life   The believing Christian lives In liberty in Christ, led by the Spirit. This does not mean he/she is free to do what they please but this is freedom from the law and the flesh in the Spirit and we are able to please God. Every believer is a child of God – a rightful heir and more, joint heirs with Christ.  This adoption never needs to be repeated and is permanent.  this is the grace of God.  the believer has new standing before God, from grim condemnation to privileged heir.  The believer’s heirship is future hope and present reality. We possess in principle what we look forward to in  full possession

But he, being full of the Holy Spoirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God (56) and said, “Look! I see the heavens opening and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!”

(57) Then they cried out with a loud voice, stopped their ears, and ran at him with one accord; (58) and they cast him out of the city and stoned him.  And the witnesses laid down their clothes at the feet of a young man named Saul.  (59) And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”  (60)  Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not charge them with this sin.”  And when he said this, he fell asleep

The Acts of the Apostles was written by Luke, writer of one of the gospels and historian of the early Church.  After Pentecost, (a Jewish festival celebrated 50 days after Passover –  originally celebrating the first fruits of the harvest and later considered a time for annual renewal of the Mosaic covenant)  the Holy Spirit entered those waiting in a small room in Jerusalem.   There was an explosion of spiritual energy.  The ancient church grew so rapidly in this time of miraculous expansion that the apostles found that they were spending time and energy on tending to the material concerns of the new converts. The solution, to appoint seven ministers/deacons of the early church, included the appointment of Stephen to this ministry.  Luke tells us that Stephen was preaching the gospel while also supervising relief for the poor in his role as deacon.  Apparently his preaching greatly antagonized a faction of the Jewish people and Stephen was brought before the Sanhedrin, the same Jewish Council which had only recently “judged” Christ.

Stephen was accused of blasphemy against Moses and God for he spoke his conviction that God never intended to confine His favors to one place and that the temple would be destroyed and the customs of the ceremonial law would be changed.  Stephen argued that both the temple and the law were figures of things to come.  He claimed that God had been in the world many ages before the holy temple was built and the law given –   Abraham had been called by God before the law and was justified by faith.  David was not allowed to build a temple for God as God was satisfied with the tabernacle built to His specifications. It was not until David’s son, Solomon, was king that God allowed the temple to be built. Stephen said in essence that it was not treason or blasphemy to say that Jesus ended the law and that the temple service, stripped of the ceremony of the old law, had ended.  Stephen emphasized that God could not be confined to temples made with hands.

The verses tell us the story of the first Christian martyr.  Stephen spoke in front of the Sanhedrin and condemned their rejection of God and the gospel.   He compared their actions to  those of their fathers who also rejected the prophets of God.  The men of the Sanhedrin gnashed their teeth – their hatred and rejection of Stephen’s words caused them to act as beasts.  They cried out with loud voices to silence him and excite each other – to drive out reason.  They ran upon him with one accord, all in haste and violence – to terrify and silence him.  They cast him out of the city and stoned him, pretending to execute the law of Moses.  We are told that the executioners took off their upper garments and laid them at the feet of Saul – this is the first we hear of him – later to become the Apostle Paul.

Stephen pulled himself to his kneeS and manifested – by looking at the heavens and speaking in a loud voice – that he saw the glory of God.  He saw Jesus in his human nature so as to be seen by bodily eyes.  He saw Jesus at the right hand of God.  Stephen’s final act was prayer for his persecutors as he knelt and cried out in a loud voice asking for forgiveness for his murderers.  Clearly this terrible event stuck in the mind of Saul, who later as Paul, bitterly regretted his part in this death.

God has a plan – a cosmic plan.  All things work together for good.   It was the martyrdom of Stephen, witnessed and agreed to by Saul/Paul, together with the persecutions that took place at this time that led to the conversion of Paul at the intervention on the road to Damascus.

And certain men came down from Judea and taught the brethren, “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved.”  (2) Therefore, when Paul and Barnabas had no small dissension and dispute with them, they determined that Paul and Barnabas and certain others of them should go up to Jerusalem, to the apostles and elders about this question.

(22)  Then it pleased the apostles and elders with the whole church, to send chosen men of their own company to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas, namely, Judas who was also named Barsabas, and Silas leading men among the brethren.

They wrote this letter by them: 

The apostles, the elders and the brethren, To the brethren who are of the Gentiles in Antioch, Syria and Cilicia:  Greetings.

(24) Since we have heard that some who went out from us have troubled you with words, unsettling your souls, saying, “You must be circumcised and keep the law” – to whom we gave no such commandment – (25) it seemed good to us, being assembled with one accord, to send chosen men to you with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, (26) men who have risked their lives for the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.  (27)  We have therefore sent Judas and Silas, who will also report the same things by word of mouth.  (28) For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things:  (29)  that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality.  If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well.

Chapter 15 of the Acts of the Apostles, written by Luke, concerns the matter of Jewish Christians (Judaizers) who traveled from Jerusalem to Antioch of Syria claiming authority to preach the theological necessity of circumcision and obedience to the Mosaic Law as necessary for salvation to the newly converted Gentile Christians.  This position was also being promoted among Paul’s recent converts in Galatia.  They were firmly opposed by Paul and Barnabus, newly returned to Antioch after their successful first missionary journey – this became such a contentious matter that Paul and Barnabas were appointed, along with others of the Antioch congregation, to travel to Jerusalem to meet with the apostles and elders to clarify the position of the ancient church on evangelization of the Gentiles.

Some of the converted Jews still expected a temporal kingdom from the Messiah – they now saw that the Gentiles were included in the salvation of the gospel and wished to extend their hegemony over the Gentiles.  They did not understand or accept what the gospel was telling them.  The position of these men had long been “Except you be circumcized you cannot be saved.”  Paul and Barbabus opposed this.  They knew that Christ unites Jew and Gentile in Himself.  He freed them from the ceremonial law and rites of circumcision.

The apostles, elders and other members of the church discussed this matter at the ensuing Council of Jerusalem.  Luke tells us that Peter, spoke as a missionary, not as head of the Jerusalem church.  Peter spoke. (and i am including his words as quoted in Acts 15: 7-11).

“Men and Brethren, you know that a good while ago God chose among us, that by my mouth the Gentiles should hear the word of the gospel and believe.  (8) So God, who knows the heart, acknowledged them by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as He did to us, (9) and made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith.  (10) Now therefore, why do you test God by putting a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?  (11) But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved in the same manner as they”

After Peter  reminded the Council that Paul’s approach to the Gentiles was God’s divine will, Paul and Barnabus spoke of the validation of their missionary policy through “miraculous signs and wonders”.  Then James, the half brother of Jesus and the head of the Jerusalem church,  who presided over the Council, said in effect that the Council cannot oppose the will of God and that Jewish Christians should not stand against the Gentile mission.  The vote of the Council on this matter was unanimous in support of James’s decision and a letter was drafted to be circulated among the Christian churches in affirmation of their position.

The Council of Jerusalem was a hugely important moment in the life of the church.  It recognized that salvation through Jesus Christ was meant for the Jews and the Gentiles and boldy refused to impede the progress Paul had made with the Gentiles.  The Council acknowledged that the Messiah had freed them from the Law.  They had refused to side with the Judaizers and they could not be in opposition to the will of God.