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Scripture Reading: Rom. 1:16-17
II. The life of Christ:
А. Romans 5:10 says, “If we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled.” This is also a key word of the book of Romans concerning God’s dynamic salvation. It unveils to us that the full salvation of God is of two sections:
1. The first is the section of foundation:
а. By the redemption of Christ judicially.
b. As the initiation of God’s salvation.
2. The second is the section of consummation:
а. By the life of Christ organically.
b. As the completion of God’s salvation.
B. The accomplishments by the life of Christ in God’s dynamic salvation:
1. Giving the believing sinners, who have been justified by God in Christ as the righteousness from God to them, life in order that they may live in this life before God — 1:17.
2. Making the God-justified believers the many sons of God (8:14; Heb. 2:10), who are the many brothers of Christ (Rom. 8:29) through regeneration (1 Pet. 1:3) by the Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2) with Christ’s producing and multiplying life.
3. Imparting life to the dying believers that they may grow in Christ out of death unto maturity — v. 11.
4. Moving in them by the Spirit of life that they may enjoy Christ’s life with its peace — vv. 5-6.
5. Sanctifying them (6:19-20) with the holy nature of God as the holy element.
6. Renewing them, by the Spirit of life, based upon the washing of regeneration, from the old element of their old man into the new constitution of their new man — 12:2b; Titus 3:5.
7. Transforming them metabolically by the Spirit of life with the element of Christ’s divine life, from their old constitution to their new constitution, for the building up of Christ’s organic Body — Rom. 12:2b, 5; 2 Cor. 3:18.
8. Conforming them to the image of Christ as the firstborn Son of God that they may be the full-grown God-men for the Triune God’s expression — Rom. 8:29.
9. Glorifying them through the redemption of their body that they may enter into the freedom of glory and their full sonship — vv. 21, 23, 30.
10. Making them reign as kings mainly over the negative things such as Satan, sin, the world, the flesh, etc.
11. All the above ten items are for the producing and building up of the organic Body of Christ expressed as the local churches; this is covered in the last five chapters of the book of Romans.
I would like to point out the first verse of Hymns, #483, which says,
Buried with Christ, and raised with Him too;
What is there left for me to do?
Simply to cease from struggling and strife,
Simply to walk in newness of life.
Glory be to God!
I like this hymn. It is one of the highest hymns in all the hymnals of Christianity. How wonderful and excellent it is that we have been buried with Christ! But burial is not the end. Following burial, there is resurrection. If burial were the end, that would be the death of Adam. Christ’s death is not like this. He was buried and raised up, and we are in Him. Thus, we have been buried and raised up with Him. Now the only thing left for us to do is simply to walk in newness of life. This stanza comes from Romans 6:4, which says, “We have been buried therefore with Him through baptism into His death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we might walk in newness of life.”
We were crucified with Christ, buried with Christ, and raised up with Christ to simply walk in newness of life. A husband should not try to love his wife. He needs only to walk in newness of life. If he tries to love his wife, his loving will not last. His loving of his wife must be his walking in newness of life. In the same way, a wife should not try to submit herself to her husband. She should simply walk in newness of life. The newness of life in verse 4 is in contrast with the old man in verse 6. We were the old man, but today we are something new. We are God’s new creation, the new man. Now what is there left for us to do? We should simply walk in newness of life.
In this chapter we come to the second element of the structure of the gospel of God. We have seen that the gospel of God is constructed with three elements. The first one is the righteousness of God; the second, the life of Christ; and the third, the faith of the believers. The righteousness of God is judicial, the life of Christ is organic, and the faith of the believers is practical.
The judicial righteousness of God has taken care of all the requirements of God’s righteous law. God’s judicial righteousness brings God Himself in Christ to us as our life, and this is organic. Then the faith of the believers is needed, and this faith is practical. If the righteousness of God plus the life of Christ were without the faith of the believers, nothing would happen. The righteousness of God and the life of Christ to us need not our own faith but the faith of the believers to make them practical.
Romans 5:17 says, “If, by the offense of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.” This verse tells us that death reigns through Adam. But we need to be those who receive the abundance of two things: the abundance of grace and the abundance of the gift of righteousness. We have seen that righteousness has two aspects: objective and subjective. Here the righteousness is objective. The objective righteousness has been given to us as a gift. Also, Romans 3:24 says that we are justified freely by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. We believers have received two things in abundance: the abundance of grace and the abundance of the gift of righteousness. We have received the grace and the gift.
I would like us to be impressed with footnote 2 on Romans 5:17 in the Recovery Version. This footnote is one of the many nuggets and diamonds buried in the Recovery Version. It says,
The gift of righteousness erases judgment. Judgment comes from sin, but righteousness comes from grace. Righteousness always accompanies grace and is its result. Subjective righteousness (4:25b) comes from grace (vv. 17, 19), and grace comes from objective righteousness (vv. 1-2).
When I wrote this footnote, I spent much time to get the word erase. Objective righteousness is Christ as God’s righteousness given to us to be our righteousness, and this righteousness erases God’s righteous judgment on us, the sinners. Adam brought judgment to us through sin. Christ as righteousness erases this judgment. Judgment comes from sin, but righteousness comes from grace. Grace is also Christ. It is God in the Son to be enjoyed by us. Objective righteousness issues in grace, and grace issues in subjective righteousness. Eventually, all three — objective righteousness, grace, and subjective righteousness — are Christ Himself. Objective righteousness is Christ given to us, grace is Christ enjoyed by us, and subjective righteousness is Christ lived out of us.
Now we come to the second element of the structure of God’s gospel — the life of Christ.
Romans 5:10 says, “If we, being enemies, were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more we will be saved in His life, having been reconciled.” This is a key word of the book of Romans concerning God’s dynamic salvation. Being reconciled to God through the death of His Son is by the judicial redemption of Christ. If we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, much more, will we be edified, taught, or perfected? No — much more we will be saved, not saved in the knowledge of the Bible but saved in His life. Two crucial things are mentioned in this verse: the death of Christ and His life. We were reconciled through the death of Christ judicially. Now we are to be saved in the life of Christ organically.
We should not say that the death of Christ saves us. If we say this, we have not gotten into the crystallization of Romans 5:10. Christ’s death, at the most, redeems us, reconciles us to God. Reconciliation is a part of the complete, eternal redemption of God judicially. After that we need something organic in God’s dynamic salvation, and this organic thing is the saving in the life of Christ. Saving is an organic matter.
Now I would like to point out eight major and crucial verses that use the word life in the book of Romans. Romans 5:10 tells us that we are to be saved in the life of Christ. Verse 17 says that those who receive the abundance of grace and the abundance of the gift of righteousness will reign in life, and verse 18 says, “Through one righteous act unto justification of life to all men.” Then verse 21 says, “In order that just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness unto eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” The righteousness here is objective righteousness. Objective righteousness is judicially given to us, but subjective righteousness is organically lived out of us. Here it says that the grace given to us will reign, not in but unto eternal life. These are the four crucial usages of the word life in Romans 5.
Initially, in God’s New Testament economy the infinite grace of God provides the believers in Christ with God’s free justification (3:24), and this free justification of God is of life for the believers to have life (5:18). Then the abounding grace of God in its fullness (John 1:16) further affords the believers the capacity:
(1) To reign in this age over the tribulations (Rom. 5:2-3a), the law of the indwelling sin (8:2; 7:17, 20), the usurping Satan (16:20), the charming ages of Satan’s world (12:2; John 12:31), and the environmental troubles with the opponents of the believers (Rom. 8:31-39).
(2) To rule in the coming age with Christ as His co-kings over the nations for one thousand years (Rev. 20:4, 6).
(3) To reign over the restored nations (21:24) in eternity (22:1-5) in the new heaven and new earth (21:1) unto eternal life (Rom. 5:21) in the fullest enjoyment of the divine life in Christ in the divine administration as the top divine blessing in the entire universe.
There are three more crucial verses in chapter 8 that speak of life. They are verses 2, 6, and 11. Verse 2 speaks of the law of the Spirit of life. Verse 6 says, “The mind set on the flesh is death, but the mind set on the spirit is life and peace.” The Spirit of life as a law releases us from the bondage of the law of sin and death, and if we set our mind on the spirit, we will receive life and peace. Then verse 11 says, “If the Spirit of the One 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 indwells you.” Mortal means dying. This means that we are dying ones. Christ as the indwelling Spirit will give life to us in our dying body.
Now we want to point out verse 4 of Romans 6: “We have been buried therefore with Him through baptism into His death, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so also we might walk in newness of life.” If we walk in newness of life, the Spirit of life as a law will release us, set us free, from the law, the bondage, of sin and death. Then we will also enjoy this life with peace. Such a life will then be continually given to us by being dispensed into all the parts of our being through the indwelling Spirit. The eight verses mentioned above are so rich that each one needs a conference. I would encourage you to memorize them so that you are able to recite them.
Romans 5:10 unveils to us that the full salvation of God is of two sections.
The first is the section of foundation by the redemption of Christ judicially as the initiation of God’s salvation. Of course, any foundation of a building is an initiation, but a building does not stop with its foundation. The foundation is the base and indicates that more building work is required. When we built the meeting hall in Anaheim, we were happy when the foundation was laid, but this also caused us much anxiety because we were wondering how we would complete the rest of the building. We realized that there was much work left to consummate the building.
The second section of God’s full salvation is the section of consummation by the life of Christ organically as the completion of God’s salvation.
Now we want to see what the life of Christ, as the continuation of God’s building, has accomplished for us.
First, it gives the believing sinners, who have been justified by God in Christ as the righteousness from God to them, life in order that they may live in this life before God (1:17).
Also, this life makes the God-justified believers the many sons of God (8:14; Heb. 2:10), who are the many brothers of Christ (Rom. 8:29) through regeneration (1 Pet. 1:3) by the Spirit of life (Rom. 8:2) with Christ’s producing and multiplying life.
This life is imparted to the dying believers that they may grow in Christ out of death unto maturity (v. 11). Our regeneration transpired in our spirit. But we have another part of our being that is dying, that is, our mortal body. We need the life of Christ to be dispensed into this dying part.
The indwelling Christ moves in the believers by the Spirit of life that they may enjoy Christ’s life with its peace (vv. 5-6). People who gamble set their mind on gambling, but our mind is set on the spirit. We can set our mind on the spirit because the indwelling pneumatic Christ is moving in us. The result is that we have Christ’s life with peace.
Another accomplishment of the life of Christ in God’s dynamic salvation is that it sanctifies us (6:19-20) with the holy nature of God as the holy element.
This life renews us, by the Spirit of life, based upon the washing of regeneration, from the old element of our old man into the new constitution of our new man (12:2b; Titus 3:5).
It also transforms us metabolically by the Spirit of life with the element of Christ’s divine life, from our old constitution to our new constitution, for the building up of Christ’s organic Body (Rom. 12:2b, 5; 2 Cor. 3:18).
This life goes on to conform us to the image of Christ as the firstborn Son of God that we may be the full-grown God-men for the Triune God’s expression (Rom. 8:29).
Such a life glorifies us through the redemption of our body that we may enter into the freedom of glory and our full sonship (vv. 21, 23, 30). Although we are sons of God, many times we are weak because of our mortal body. But one day our body will be glorified and redeemed. We will be the glorious sons of God, who can soar like an eagle. Isaiah 40:31 says, “Those who wait on Jehovah will renew their strength; / They will mount up with wings like eagles.” In the coming age, when our bodies are redeemed, we will be able to fly like the transcendent, soaring birds.
The life of Christ in which we are saved also makes us reign as kings mainly over the negative things such as Satan, sin, the world, the flesh, etc.
All the above ten items are for the producing and building up of the organic Body of Christ expressed as the local churches; this is covered in the last five chapters of the book of Romans.
