(Message from September 5, 2026)
Romans 5:1-11 Common English Bible
5 Therefore, since we have been made righteous through his faithfulness, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 We have access by faith into this grace in which we stand through him, and we boast in the hope of God’s glory. 3 But not only that! We even take pride in our problems, because we know that trouble produces endurance, 4 endurance produces character, and character produces hope. 5 This hope doesn’t put us to shame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.
6 While we were still weak, at the right moment, Christ died for ungodly people. 7 It isn’t often that someone will die for a righteous person, though maybe someone might dare to die for a good person. 8 But God shows his love for us, because while we were still sinners Christ died for us. 9 So, now that we have been made righteous by his blood, we can be even more certain that we will be saved from God’s wrath through him. 10 If we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son while we were still enemies, now that we have been reconciled, how much more certain is it that we will be saved by his life? 11 And not only that: we even take pride in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, the one through whom we now have a restored relationship with God.
Welcome back to our series on Romans.
Romans, is the sort of thing that you should read, standing up and pacing about the room, and with great dramatic effect. (Some scholars believe that this is how Paul dictated his letters. Not sitting at a desk like this picture, but pacing about.) Additionally, you should read this passage multiple times. You should read it one sentence at a time and let that sentence hang there in the air, look at it, let it resonate, feel it.
Paul, deep in thought, explains in tightly organized prose his theology. He is talking about a lot of big words: Righteousness, Justification, Sanctification, Reconciliation and Wrath. This is heavy stuff.
When I sat down and read this passage, my first thought is, “I need to read all the commentaries”, and I did read some of them. But first, I read through it and let each sentence speak for itself for a moment. And I’m going to share some of what rose to the top.
For example, it starts: “Therefore, since we have been made righteous through his faithfulness, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
What words stand out for you? His Faithfulness. In other words, he’s never let us go and he has never given up on us.
I started singing in my head:
Never gonna give you up
Never gonna let you down
Never gonna run around and desert you
Never gonna make you cry
Never gonna say goodbye
Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you
source: https://www.lyricsondemand.com/r/rickastleylyrics/nevergonnagiveyouuplyrics.html
God has strived to put things right. The phrase: “We have peace with God” also stands out for me. Not by our own actions, but through His, we are at peace with God. I want everyone to sit with that for a moment. Does that feel contrary in any way to your understanding of Christianity? There is still this ethos out in the world about Christianity, that we must be perfect. That we cannot stumble, or then we are hypocrites if we do, and also, we will disappoint God or invite His wrath or Judgement. And we beat ourselves up about it. But that is not true, at least, not according to Paul. According to Paul, because of this beautiful reciprocal faith, we are at Peace with God. There is nothing to fear.
This is Grace. A gift that we don’t have to earn. We are at Peace with God, a gift freely given.
There is so much that we can learn from God’s Grace. And the first is to give grace to ourselves. Who here is their own worst critic?
Give yourself Grace
I heard a lovely idea by Dr Dan the Psychologist (who I follow on Instagram). He says that whenever you feel like you aren’t good enough, think about a kitten.
In many ways kittens are not good enough. A kitten can’t take care of itself, it’s helpless. A kitten can’t catch any mice for you. A kitten doesn’t know anything. A kitten will completely fall short on giving out-of-towners directions to Jackpot. A kitten will not cook you dinner. But a kitten is still good. It is cute and curious and loving. And the fact that there are things that the kitten can’t do well does not take away from all the ways that the kitten is good. And the same goes for you. You can always think of ways in which you are not good enough. You can always compare yourself with someone else, or some arbitrary standard and feel like you don’t measure up. But not measuring up to some standards does not change all of the good things that you do have to offer. And those critical thoughts about yourself only have power because they cause you to forget about all of the really good parts of who you are. The kitten is imperfect, but that does not stop the kitten from being lovable. You are imperfect, but that does not stop you from being good and lovable.
Being loved despite our imperfections is a lot like Grace. And you know what else, your worth is not tied to your usefulness. We live in a world where what you do for a living defines your worth. How much you get paid. Our worth is what we have. What you have to offer in the way of talents. How hard you work. Etc. etc. What happens then, when you are no longer able to work, or you are no longer able to help out? You. Are. Still. worthy. You are still valued. You are still loved.
Give Grace to Others
Another thing we can learn from God’s Grace is to give grace to others:
The bottom line here is that our passage today is all about relationships. Our relationship with God and our relationship with other people. Grace is all about relationships. Think about your relationships. Do you demand that the people you love be perfect? Or do you offer them Grace? In fact, often, we love despite those that we love having many faults, do we not?
Many, many years ago, when I was a single gal, and out in the world dating. I always came to this point with any boy I dated when I started to notice all of their faults, and I couldn’t get past it.
Nowadays they would call this getting “the Ick”. I joked that I had a three-month rule. After three months, most guys became unattractive to me.
Maybe, if a man could be perfect, and never show his faults, we could have gotten by? I’m not sure. Well, that, my friend, is the laws of the Old Testament in a nutshell. Like trying to be the perfect boyfriend or girlfriend forever and ever, never showing your faults. It is impossible, isn’t it? Furthermore, that is not real love, and it is not an authentic relationship. And it will fail.
So, whether I stayed in a relationship for more than three months or not, was a great litmus test for whether I was infatuated with someone, or actually in love. If it was infatuation, it died the moment I started to see their little faults. If it was love, and I still wanted to be there, that meant I loved him despite any faults I might notice. That is a type of Grace. To really know someone and love them anyway.
And do we need to earn the love of our parents, or siblings, or children? Or does it come naturally, like a gift. Again, that is Grace. A thing that we do not earn but naturally flows from God.
There are many things that destroy relationships in our fallen world: greed, abuse, neglect, physical violence, and isolation to name a few. These are the things that truly hurt the people around us, those who are close to us especially. These are the things of unchanged hearts, sin and chaos that is quite separate from God. Abuse is not love and should never be mistaken for such.
When I talk about Grace, it’s for when your husband chews too loud and is forgetful about birthdays or puts on some weight. Or because your wife snores or leaves the bathroom counter messy or comes home from work hangry. Because none of us are perfect. We all require grace.
And Grace isn’t just for the people who are closest to us, it’s for all our relationships in life. Let’s offer Grace to our coworkers, and our brothers and sisters in Christ, and to that guy who honked his horn at you on the way to the grocery store. I mean, we have no idea what he’s got going on behind the scenes. If it’s not a crime, let’s err on the side of kindness.
Another strong argument for Grace vs The laws of the Old Testament is that strict adherence to rule based religion tends to bring our attention inward and causes us to focus on self instead of being community minded. Legalism will always cause you to question, “what am I doing wrong? How can I better follow the rules, and reach perfection?” That is not love. Love looks outward. Sometimes, when we love, we even start to forget about ourselves.
You all know that my mom had hip replacement surgery a week and a half ago. That was very scary for me. My mom has always seemed invincible to me. She is active and self-assured, and independent. But when you have a big surgery, it strips you of all of that. And in addition, they send you home a few short hours after your surgery, even though you are in no fit state to take care of yourself. So, I signed the papers promising to take responsibility for her, and I took her home and helped her into the house and focused on her hourly needs for two days straight:
She had to get up every hour and walk at least 10 steps. She had to do exercises 3 times a day, she had to have an ice pack on for 30 minutes and then off for 30. She had many medications to track throughout the day. She had these compression machines that needed to be on her legs to keep from getting blook clots. And there is all the usual stuff, like drinking lots of water, eating and going to the bathroom. Then there are all her pets that needed care. And then my dad, also needed 3 square meals prepared for him.
Those first couple days were a lot. I got to the point where I was forgetting to eat, and to take a shower. My mom needed me and I love her deeply. That’s the love that almost forgets self and radiates out to those who naturally fall under its glow: like your spouse who needs to talk about their day, or a newborn baby who needs constant care, or your child who wants your advice. The world falls away when those who you love need you.
Back to our passage:
Dropped into the middle of the first paragraph of our text is this section that jumps out at me, and it almost stands apart from the rest of the text:
Paul says, “But not only that! We even take pride in our problems, because we know that trouble produces endurance, 4 endurance produces character, and character produces hope. 5 This hope doesn’t put us to shame, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.”
This passage acknowledges something that a lot of folks struggle with. Life is not always going to be easy. God does not promise us an easy life. Trouble will come. Paul is speaking from experience. According to 2 Corinthians, which was written before Romans Paul recounts many of his hardships:
2 Corinthians 11:23-30 English Standard Version
23 ….I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. 24 Five times I received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one. 25 Three times I was beaten with rods. Once I was stoned. Three times I was shipwrecked; a night and a day I was adrift at sea; 26 on frequent journeys, in danger from rivers, danger from robbers, danger from my own people, danger from Gentiles, danger in the city, danger in the wilderness, danger at sea, danger from false brothers; 27 in toil and hardship, through many a sleepless night, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure. 28 And, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure on me of my anxiety for all the churches.”
Paul also talked of a thorn in his side, some unnamed physical illness that plagued him. Paul knew about troubles, and he told us that he faced them with endurance, and he is telling us here that he learned something from those troubles they produced in him character. I imagine character here could mean empathy, patience, passion for his mission, total faith and reliance on God to get him through it. And that character, those fruits of the spirit that have been made manifest is him through all of this, give him hope.
I have known many people who have had something bad happen to them and cited that as proof that God either doesn’t exist or doesn’t care. It is shocking for many to think that our faith does not protect us. But Paul doesn’t see it that way at all. His entire life story is riddled with bad things happening to him and God showing up for him in the midst of it.
Paul’s journey through trouble, to character, to hopefulness, is a very real journey for many people in life. Have you ever been thankful for something hard that you went through because of the person that it has made you today? Or has personal hardship prepared you to help others through hard times?
And truly, sometimes, we simply cannot see the good in a situation. Where no silver lining appears on the horizon. That is when we must lean into God’s unchanging love. When all else in this world is inconsistent. God remains the same. God’s love is poured into us by the Holy Spirit ultimately making it all worthwhile. And I think it helps to remember, whenever we go through hard times and it causes our faith to wobble, that Jesus also suffered and died to give us peace.
And that is the crazy thing, the love that flows out of God, we all naturally and freely fall under that glow.
Grace that is driven by love, is the Grace that God extends wholeheartedly to us through Jesus. In fact, Jesus’ life, his ministry is all about revealing God’s love. Even in his death, he reveal’s God’s love for us.
Jesus says, in John 15:13, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”
Paul takes that a step further when he says, “While we were still weak, at the right moment, Christ died for ungodly people. 7 It isn’t often that someone will die for a righteous person, though maybe someone might dare to die for a good person. 8 But God shows his love for us, because while we were still sinners Christ died for us.”
And that is our invitation: Jesus didn’t just lay down his life for his friends who were sitting around the table, he gave his life also for the Romans and for Paul, and the Great Cloud of witnesses that would come after and for us sitting here today so that we are also at Peace with God.
Jesus shows us that God is love. That is who God was, is and always will be.