The first thing to notice here is the last part of verse 25 and verse 26 are referring to what was just explained. In verses 23, 24 and the first part of verse 25, Paul had laid out the foundational truth of the gospel: we have all sinned, we have all fallen short of the glory of God, we are all justified freely by grace, through redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whose blood is a propitiation (appeasement), for our sins - and this is to be received by faith.
So, what was God's purpose for creating man, allowing him to fall and take on a fractured, broken, sinful nature, all with the plan in place to crush His Son on the cross to satisfy the just penalty for that sin that we preferred?
This was to show God's righteousness
This is the purpose of the gospel - as Paul described in Chapter 1 verses 16 and 17 of Romans:
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith."
Within the gospel, we see Gods righteousness revealed. What is righteousness?
Righteousness refers to character - and in the case of God (who is the only one truly righteous) - it refers to perfect character, genuine, upright, holy, fair, and impartial.
The gospel, Christ living a perfect life, then going to the cross as the perfect Lamb on our behalf, was to show God's perfect character, perfect mercy, and perfect grace! We need to be on our knees in broken thankfulness!
Father forgive us for ever taking our eyes off of your perfect righteousness and making this about us in any way...its all about You Lord.
because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
forbearance: self restraint, tolerance
I believe Paul is describing here God's patience with us and our sin. While God cannot overlook or ever be in the presence of sin, He does show forbearance as part of His righteous character - meaning He does not destroy us and send us to eternal damnation on the spot due to our sinfulness (which is what we deserve). Instead, He patiently gives us time on earth to be drawn to Him - again we need to be on our knees in broken thankfulness!
I would argue that this forbearance is not only shown by God towards the lost, but also towards us as believers. Our purpose as believers is to live a life that points to God - we die to ourselves, we draw close to God, and we long to become more like Christ so that the world will see God's righteousness, God's glory, through us. Yet, we realize that we continually fail at this as God reveals areas of our life that are not giving Him the absolute glory that He deserves.
God is faithful and patient, His shows His forbearance towards His children - helping us, molding us, lifting us up when we stumble - so that His righteousness is displayed all the more! Thank You Dad!
It was to show his righteousness at the present time
Paul declares again, for the second time, that the purpose of all that God has done, is to display His righteousness. We need to take note - Paul must have thought it was crucial that we get this - laying it out twice in two verses.
We cannot be caught up in thinking that this life is just about where we are or are not going when we die - that is a side note in the bigger, and much more important picture of God's perfect and holy character, God's righteousness being displayed through us as we walk as lights in a dark, dark world.
Paul adds here "at the present time" - which refers to Christ coming, and fulfilling the Old Testament laws and prophecies - which were types and shadows, all revealing the righteous character of God in some way, but not completely and perfectly - as Christ did at this "present time."
so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
just: (similar to righteous) given or rewarded rightly, deserved punishment or reward
justifier: rendering, causing or becoming our punishment and/or reward.
It's obvious throughout Romans so far that we do not deserve a reward, so God being just, gives the deserved sentence of condemnation to the lost. But what about those of us described in this verse, "who have faith in Jesus"...
God, being the justifier, has caused His Son to become our punishment, so that God could justly declare us righteous, innocent and holy through His Son!
We cannot take this "Great Exchange" lightly. God is not able have even the slightest sinful thought in His presence. For us to be able to come to a restored relationship with Him, we needed a perfect lamb - sinless and righteous - to both pay the penalty for our sin, offering complete forgiveness, and giving us a perfect righteousness that we could never obtain...ever.
2 Corinthians 5:21 -
For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
The only way we can be in the presence of God, both now on earth and forever in heaven, is if we have complete forgiveness and perfect righteousness...which has been given to us through His Son!
I have touched on this several times throughout this post because I believe that we as Christians (myself first and foremost) do not fully grasp this "Great Exchange", that Jesus became something that His Father had to turn His back on, and this pleased the Father, to crush His Son - it satisfied the penalty. Pray that God would never stop revealing to us the depths of this amazing act of grace and mercy!
No comments:
Post a Comment