The Proof of God's Love for Sinners

What I've been doing through this, and Roger started off in Romans 5.1, and I've been trying to, you can't just take verses out of context. The context is the whole chapter up to 10, up and through 10, and then there's a change at 10 and 11. As we go on here, I think keeping it in context is important. So we can excitingly look to our futures.

We certainly do stand in the presence of grace, and we boast. We boast in the hope of the glory of God. Less than this does not suit our God anything less. to hold before us. He will have us to be with Him and with Christ in His own glory. That's His will.

What do we know? We know that the righteousness of God, or we know that righteousness that we have is God's righteousness. We've learned that. It's not man's righteousness. We also know that divine righteousness is just the starting point for us as believers. No wonder that the grace of God is the ground in which we stand. And that the glory of God is the sole adequate hope when we consider the person or the work of the Lord Jesus. So with knowing all of that, we can boast in Him.

Nevertheless, we are in the place of trial. We live in a place that's trouble to us. We're in the wilderness. Though sheltered by the blood of the Lamb and redeemed from Egypt and its prince, here above all we're put to the proof. This is where the proving ground is.

There's no resources that appear as we look around that would be of benefit to us. So God calls us to depend on and confide in Him, especially as the opposition or the enemy seeks to make us murmur in unbelief. I love that term, murmur in unbelief. Both as to the journey and as to the hope at the end of it. There's nothing but desert around us. Now I think it takes the Lord and the Holy Spirit a while to open up our understanding that we really do live in a desert. We really do. Do we boast in hope despite of all of this? Yes, we do. And not only so, but we boast in our tribulations. And we talked about that a lot last week. Boasting in our tribulations is, I think, a difficult thing.

But when we begin to realize that where we really live is a house of bondage, that it's a wilderness which is a scene of temptation, and the land calls for conflict with the powers of darkness, I think it becomes evident that this is not what we have been suited for by being recreated in Christ. Nothing but desert around. The flesh can never do, the flesh can never boast in sufferings, But faith, while it increases our feeling, alone gives us triumph. The flesh can never boast in sufferings.

I know you and you know me. The first time it hurts a little bit, I'm complaining. But I learn, through God's Word and through just growing as a believer, that I can begin to be thankful and boast about the trials that I have. So here, however, there's a process which we took note of last week.

And the process, in hoping for the glory of God, our boast is direct. It's not so with our tribulations. We should and do boast in them, but it's not immediate. It doesn't show up the day you're saved. It is the fruit of an intelligent apprehension of God's gracious aim in these afflictions.

Paul proceeded to set out how we are brought to navigate the trials of the way, because we don't know how to do that when we become a believer. We don't know how to navigate trials. We boast in tribulations, as we talked about last week. that we know, we have experiential knowledge, that tribulation works endurance. Endurance works experience or tried character, and we talked about the character being that manifestation of the character of the Lord Jesus Christ in the new life we have comes forth. And that produces hope. And what does this hope do? It makes us not ashamed.

Why? Because the love of God has been shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit or the Holy Ghost that's given to us. That's why. So studying that sequence and how that goes along, that fits the intelligent apprehension of God's gracious aim in our afflictions. That's why we have them. If you think you have them for any other reason, You're still not focusing on God's Word. We find that Christ is before our hearts. We find that tribulation does work out. It exposes the impatience of the old man. Endurance is through the second man only. I can only endure in Christ. Endurance sustains in faith and it works out experience. The proof of that is tested. We're tested and we find ourselves being approved because we've been through the test.

This is from God as shown in the gracious care for us as he strengthens our hope. And it doesn't put us to shame. It doesn't put us to shame about the future, and it doesn't disappoint us. And it's only because the Holy Spirit is shed abroad in our hearts that we're not disappointed. We know that God loves us when there was nothing lovable in us.

We are shown after self is detected and judged, the world seen in its true character, and God in more than ever proved and prized and trusted. God can be trusted. But you know, he takes it upon himself to prove it to us. Somehow we get this idea we've got to prove to him we're trustworthy. No, that's not the way he does things. He's proving to us that he can be trusted. We have His righteousness fully developed and displayed and applied before there's any reference to the love of the Spirit. I would put it this way, that God is wise in this is almost needless to say.

This is a program each one of us as believers are in. And it's a good thing that we as believers should be put in God's school of spiritual growth. And it's good that we should understand that Christ is for us. He's not against us. Then the path of an ongoing Christian experience, the Holy Spirit can touch on and in due time unfold the love of God. and he can shed it abroad in our hearts. And the Holy Spirit is given to us and we can handle it safely.

Had it been brought in before the Lord trained us, we would have readily turned to our own workings and affections from Christ and God's righteousness and love revealed in the gospel. we would make us responsible. We would look at it and say, oh, I did that. No, we didn't. God did it all, and we are the receivers. In verse five, which we just talked about, hope doesn't make us disappointed because the love of God is shed in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who's given to us.

It's remarkable. that we should notice that Paul has carefully proved two things before we even got to these verses. You know what they are? One is the ruin of man, and the other is the righteousness of God. He has laid that out in chapter 1, 2, and 3.

It's not the same with God's love. He doesn't prove it to us like he laid out our position as our ruined man or the righteousness of God. What he does, he first speaks of it here as a thing not demonstrated or proved, but it's known and it's enjoyed. He assumes, he assumes it from the common conscience of the believer.

Do you know that God loves you? You do know that because he shows you the Spirit of God shed abroad in your heart, and the Spirit's been given to us. And as we talked about last week, the very first mention of the Holy Spirit in Romans is right here in this verse. What in his first work is that he shed abroad and the first thing he shows us is that God loves us. That's the very first thing he does. Now, the verses today, what he's gonna do, he's gonna demonstrate the character of God's love. So the first verse, and I've double translated it here.

For while we were yet without strength, In due time, Christ died for the ungodly. The inner literary, it's interesting with the inner literary, the way the words are, for Christ were when we still in due time on behalf of the ungodly ones, he died. So a couple of words. Without strength is a Greek word that means feeble, weak, sickly.

It's like one of those rescued puppies. And karyos, in due time, is a really interesting word. It means a definite period of time, a definite season. Rhys says this, a strategic time, a time determined by a set of circumstances which make the peculiar point of time part of the efficient work of the action or the set of actions. So this is God's timing specific. The fact that man's total moral inability is stated here in the gentlest possible term, is it is a bankruptcy of all moral and spiritual inclination towards God and holiness, as well as a power to be, lacking the power to be good or to do anything good, or even to think good. Yet unto the scene of helplessness like this, God sends his son.

For what? What did he do it? Why did he do it? To die for the ungodly. No return or responses demanded. It is absolute grace for the ungodly. That's a quote from William Newell. I just love that quote because he gets it. that God does all of this, you know, I like the saying, and it registers in my mind, well, all that God has done, he never called me up and said, is it okay if I do this? Would you like me to send my son and die if he didn't do any of that? He just did it. And he never says to me, but you gotta do this part. I don't have a part. He did it.

So, without strength, we have God's love not subjectively viewed, but its display pointed out and grounded on the great objective fact that the death of Christ is for us and outside of us. Even the believer who is convinced of his ungodliness, he's one that's slow to appreciate that he's powerless. You get that part? If you and I lived in an environment of Reformed theology, we couldn't say this. This would not be a true statement for us because we would always be taught that we have to keep doing something to make God look at us and pay attention to us and bless us more, that we are not Powerless. You've got some power, so use it. This point is that we have to appreciate, even though it takes a long time, how powerless we really are. It was good to know that as man, all was lost. All of it was lost.

He had to either deal with one of two things with God, every man. He either has to deal with his wrath, in unbelief, or he has to deal with God in his righteousness by faith. Those are the only two choices we have. Either I'm going to deal with God in his wrath, or I'm going to deal with his righteousness by faith. There is then the love of God in us. It's shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, but the foundation of this love is the death of Christ. That's where it comes from. We had as little strength because we were far from godliness.

When we were back in chapter 1, when we read in 1.18 that the righteousness of God is revealed against all ungodliness, I thought, wow, you know, he's not talking about sinners. He's not talking about any other than, I'm not like God. and I have to be if I want to be with Him. Out of the hungry heart from a couple days ago, I found this. The Holy Spirit does not reason from what man is for God, but from what God is to man.

Souls reason from what they are in themselves as to whether God can accept them. He does not accept you this way. You are looking for righteousness in yourself as the ground of acceptance with Him. You can't get peace in this way. God commended His love towards us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. The Holy Spirit always, always reasons down from what God is And this produces a total change in us, in my soul. When I begin to realize that God is always reasoning from where He is down to me, I start to change my thinking about it. I start to change. It isn't like this paragraph says, it's not that I abhor my sins, I do. I might be on walking really well, but I abhor myself. The difference between abhorring your sins and abhorring yourself.

The Holy Spirit shows us what we are, and that is one reason why he often seems to be very hard with us, and does not give us, give peace to the soul, as we are not relieved until, frankly, from our hearts, we acknowledge what we really are, godless. Until the soul comes to that point, he does not give peace. He could not. It would be healing the wound slightly. The soul has to go on until it finds there is nothing to rest on but the cross-proven goodness of God.

And then, if God be for us, who can be against us? It's a quote from John Darby. It is not after this kind of thing that the creature, that man, loves. I don't like to be told that. It is God's love poured out to the believer by the Holy Spirit. And then he says along the next verse in terms of proving, for one will hardly die for a righteous man but though perhaps for the good man, someone would dare even die. So we've got to distinguish between what's a righteous man and what's a good man. Why would he be, maybe I'll die for a good man, but I'm not gonna die for the righteous one.

Well, the Greek word means correct or righteous. It was first used of persons observed in D-I-K-E, custom, rule, or right, especially in the fulfillment of duties towards God and men, of things that were in accordance with the right thing. The English word righteous was formally spelled right-wise or straightaway. Agathos describes that which, being good in its character or construction, is beneficial in its effect, the good as being morally, honorably pleasing to God, and therefore beneficial, from Vincent. I like what Kenneth Weiss says here.

Therefore, according to Paul, though one would hardly die for the merely upright strictly just man who commands respect, he might possibly die for the noble benefit man who commands affection. So you could be totally righteous and I couldn't find somebody to die for you, but if you're a good guy and you're a loving guy, maybe. The good man does as much as ever he can and proves his moral quality by promoting the well-being of him with whom he has to do. Always includes a corresponding benefit relationship of the subject of the other, an establishment of a communion and exchange life, while the righteous man implies an innocent man. The good man, one perfect in all piety, demands excellent, honorable, princely, blessed, for example, the father of his country.

We were studying this morning in Sunday school the qualifications for an elder. And as we're going through that, we're finding out that elders are not super-Christians. They're just men that have demonstrated a shepherd's ability. But one of the things that we don't talk about in this verse, would a shepherd die for his sheep?

Yeah, he would. And he wouldn't think twice about it. He would. So, therefore, according to Paul, though one would hardly die for a merely upright, strictly just man, you know, someone that walked the line, who commands respect, he would possibly die for a noble, beneficent man who commands affection from waste.

Righteousness as such, one we value and we respect that, but it does not draw out our love so that one would die for a merely righteous person. Not that man's heart is not capable of strong affections, we certainly are. For one might die for a good man. Paul here proceeds with the wonderful words of praise concerning God's love among men. While for a sternly honest man one would die, yet someone might be found to venture death for a noble person, one would hardly die for a just man. Verse seven brings out the character of surrender, which would be involved in one man dying for another.

It would be considered amongst men the supreme sacrifice that could be made. Military men make these sacrifices all the time. A man's life is very precious to him. And the life of Christ was unspeakably precious to the Father and to him. And God said, he said, the Lord Jesus said, my God, take not away from me in the midst of my days. But what about God's love? The value of his love to God is emphasized in these verses. But he died for the ungodly sinner. He died for the guy who hated him. He died for the guy who wanted to kill him. He died for us, and he commends this love to us in a supreme sacrifice, amazing surrender.

The second person of the Trinity surrendered to the will of the Father because he's love. The love of God was concentrated in that wondrous act, the death of Christ. But for nearly 2,000 years, it has been distributed in millions of hearts by the Holy Spirit. It's unique to Him. Unique to Him. This shedding abroad in the heart is a demonstration, it rests on the gift of Christ and His death for us, wholly without us. You get that? The death of Christ was something God wanted to do. We didn't have an election to decide that he ought to do this for us. As a matter of fact, all humanity hated him. They had wanted nothing to do with him.

So this presence, the love of God towards us, abundantly free from the mixture of anything in us or of us, God didn't do this because there was something loving about us. He didn't do it because we thought it would be a good idea. Or he didn't do it because we said, if you do this, we will respond. He didn't do it for any of those reasons. Consequently, there was nothing to draw God's love out and to fix it on us with a certain result that it has. The reasoning here is this. It didn't come from God warning us about our sins. It didn't come because he made a promise to us, but from what God is.

He is love. Love proved in Christ dying for us while we were yet sinners. So the first word in a Greek sentence is always the most important word. God demonstrates, but God demonstrates his love towards us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. The very first word in this sentence is demonstrates in the interlinear.

And it's important because demonstrates is an accent verb. It's a verb, which means it's an action word. It's in the indicative mood. Everybody knows what the indicative mood is. It's the mood of reality. This is a fact. It's present tense. It's right now, going on. And it's active voice. God is doing it. Demonstrates. Demonstrates to the whole world, active mood. present tense, active voice, while we were still sinners and ungodly.

On behalf of, this little phrase in green up there, on behalf of. Has is an important phrase because it means instead of, it's a Greek word, huper, in place of. In our stead, we were due punishment for our sins. Christ, who paired us in place of, took our place. We were due death for our sins. Christ took our place. However, you could say that it's on behalf of what was due us, he took.

John 11.50, you see, it's expedient for you.

John 11.50 is where The high priest, I forget his name, is talking to the Sanhedrin, and he says to them, it's expedient for you that one man should die instead of all the people dying. The one man should die is who pair. One man's gonna die for the whole nation so that the whole nation doesn't get wiped out, and not that the whole nation perish.

Or in Galatians 3.13, Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law having become huper, a substitute for us. Vincent notes that the present tense, God continuously establishes his love in that the death of Christ remains as its most striking manifestation. So, characteristically, we were powerless. unjust, evil, nothing but sinners on the one hand, and on the other hand, God had no motive for his love other than love itself. I don't know how to emphasize that more. We somehow think there was something somewhere that God died because there was something redeemable in me. There's nothing. There's absolutely nothing. God did this because he's a lover. That's the basics of his character.

He acted in his own character as love itself. It's his own love. John puts it, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. God didn't love the world because it was lovable. He did it because that's who he is. Only God can love this way and only God can love this much. God has done and he and only he is love.

The spring is within and he needs no object to call it forth. Those whom His grace makes object of His love are holy and absolutely unlovable as to themselves. Yet He loves them, spite of all, while they were yet sinners. And this is the fullest proof of their sin and of God's love. Nothing less could be of benefit. Nothing more blessed could be done even by God. Anything different would not suit God. Wouldn't be like him. So thus he demonstrates his own love. What a resting place for both heart and conscience. He forgets nothing. He judges everything. Yet he loves us with a love that is perfect and altogether unique.

We have now to note the reasoning of Paul. Paul wasn't trying to prove the love of God. Beginning with it, as known through the Holy Spirit given to us, Paul draws conclusions after a truly divine order. The consciousness of the Christian has its just and full place, and so has the proof of divine love.

However, Shed abroad in our hearts, it demonstrates, its demonstration rests on the gift of Christ and his death for us, wholly without us. Consequently, there's nothing to draw God's love out and fix it on us, but the result is certain. The reasoning is, did not at all come from divine warnings about us, promises made to us, or from what God is, as I said.

Here then, whatever you are, read your record. Here's us. We're strengthless, we're sinning, we're hating God, Then you can begin to conceive of, if you will, just believe the sovereign uncaused love which God here in his great passage demonstrates to you. That's the one requirement that you believe.

Don't try to be worthy. If you offer to pay by an unuttered bankrupt, you are not only worthless, but you insult the grace. Self-righteousness seeks to discover in itself some cause for divine favor. Now let us not dare to try to get God to be reconciled to us through our prayers, our consecration, our works, anything. One who has believed is overwhelmed to find that this reconciliation was affected while he himself was an enemy of God's.

So we read, God was reconciling the world unto himself in 2 Corinthians 5.19. While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his son. Interesting about sin, it's everything contrary to God's holiness, righteousness, truth, and glory.

But sin was put, Sin was put by God in Christ, and God didn't spare him. And now God says to his messengers, you and me, go be ambassadors on behalf of Christ. Tell all sinners that I have battered him instead of them, that I've crucified him instead of you. Tell them I forsook him on the cross that I might not forsake you forever.

The coming in of the penalty of death declared the other ruin of the creature, but God has made that penalty the eternal witness of his love. The love of God expressed in the death of Christ is the most amazing thing in the universe. It can never be fathomed through all eternity. It is now being poured out into our hearts and the hearts of all believers by the Holy Spirit. Just for a minute, think of the greatness of its expression in the death of Christ. And also the greatness of it being shed abroad by the Holy Spirit given.

God's wondrous thought is that his love should become the life that stirs hearts so that it might circulate through the whole moral being. That's his goal. That's what he wants. Natural life is in the blood. We all have that. But the very essence of spiritual life is the love of God known in the heart by the Holy Spirit.

Thus our Lord died instead of us, taking our penalty in place of us. And that His death was in our interest, either a friend or at least someone who was done the person wrong. None of that motivated God. Christ died for those who are or were at enmity with Him. and who bitterly hated him.

And in closing, I'm going to quote from Kenneth Weiss these verses, because I think he did a great job. He said, for when we were yet without strength in a strategic season, Christ instead of us, and on behalf of those who do not have reverence for God and are devoid of piety, died for very rarely in behalf of a righteous man died. For very rarely in behalf of a righteous man would anyone die. Yet perhaps in behalf of the good man, a person would dare to even die. But God is constantly proving His own love to us because while we were yet sinners, Christ in behalf of us died. Let's close.

Father, how thankful we are for your son, and we're thankful that the very essence of your character is love, that it is unfathomable. We're so grateful. But our gratitude and our response is not equal to what you are, in what you are in your essence, in your love. And so as we grow through all eternity and the knowledge and grace of the Lord Jesus, we can apprehend more and more what your love, the love of God, really is. And we pray in your Son's precious name. Amen.