For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a righteous person someone would even dare to die. But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
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Romans 5:6-8 sits inside this longer paragraph.
Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only this, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope: and hope doesn’t disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a righteous person someone would even dare to die. But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Parallel Translations
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For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a righteous person someone would even dare to die.
But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
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For when we were yet weake accordynge to the tyme: Christ dyed for vs which were vngodly.
Yet scace will eny man dye for a rightewes man. Paraventure for a good man durst a man dye.
But God setteth out his love that he hath to vs seinge that whyll we were yet synners Christ dyed for vs.
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For Christ, when we were yet of no strength, at his time died for the vngodly.
Doutles one will scarce die for a righteous man: but yet for a good man it may be that one dare die.
But God setteth out his loue towards vs, seeing that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for vs.
Cross-references (43)
- John 15:13 (vv7–8) Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
- John 3:16 (v8) For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
- Romans 5:6 (v8) For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
- 1 Peter 3:18 (v8) Because Christ also suffered for sins once, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring you to God, being put to death in the…
- 1 John 3:16 (vv7–8) By this we know love, because he laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.
Show all 40 cross-references
- 1 John 4:9-10 (v8) By this God’s love was revealed in us, that God has sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. In this is…
- Isaiah 53:6 (v8) All we like sheep have gone astray. Everyone has turned to his own way; and Yahweh has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
- Ephesians 2:1-5 (v6) You were made alive when you were dead in transgressions and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world,…
- Ephesians 2:7 (v8) that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus;
- Romans 4:25 (vv6, 8) who was delivered up for our trespasses, and was raised for our justification.
- Romans 5:8 (v6) But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
- Colossians 2:13 (v6) You were dead through your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh. He made you alive together with him, having forgiven us all our…
- Ephesians 1:6-8 (v8) to the praise of the glory of his grace, by which he freely gave us favor in the Beloved, in whom we have our redemption through his blood,…
- Romans 5:20 (v8) The law came in that the trespass might abound; but where sin abounded, grace abounded more exceedingly;
- 1 Timothy 1:16 (v8) However, for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first, Jesus Christ might display all his patience for an example of those who were…
- Titus 3:3-5 (v6) For we were also once foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving various lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating…
- Romans 5:10 (v6) For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we will be saved by his…
- Romans 3:5 (v8) But if our unrighteousness commends the righteousness of God, what will we say? Is God unrighteous who inflicts wrath? I speak like men do.
- Titus 2:12 (v6) instructing us to the intent that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we would live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age;
- Romans 4:5 (v6) But to him who doesn’t work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness.
- Galatians 4:4 (v6) But when the fullness of the time came, God sent out his Son, born to a woman, born under the law,
- 1 Thessalonians 5:9 (v6) For God didn’t appoint us to wrath, but to the obtaining of salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ,
- Hebrews 9:26 (v6) or else he must have suffered often since the foundation of the world. But now once at the end of the ages, he has been revealed to put…
- 1 Timothy 1:9 (v6) as knowing this, that law is not made for a righteous person, but for the lawless and insubordinate, for the ungodly and sinners, for the…
- Romans 16:4 (v7) who risked their own necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks, but also all the assemblies of the Gentiles.
- Acts 11:24 (v7) For he was a good man, and full of the Holy Spirit and of faith, and many people were added to the Lord.
- 1 Peter 1:20 (v6) who was foreknown indeed before the foundation of the world, but was revealed in this last age for your sake,
- Ezekiel 16:4-8 (v6) As for your birth, in the day you were born your navel was not cut. You weren’t washed in water to cleanse you. You weren’t salted at all,…
- 2 Peter 2:5-6 (v6) and didn’t spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah with seven others, a preacher of righteousness, when he brought a flood on the world…
- Jude 1:4 (v6) For there are certain men who crept in secretly, even those who were long ago written about for this condemnation: ungodly men, turning the…
- Jude 1:15 (v6) to execute judgment on all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their works of ungodliness which they have done in an ungodly way, and of…
- Psalms 1:1 (v6) Blessed is the man who doesn’t walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand on the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of scoffers;
- Daniel 11:15 (v6) So the king of the north will come and cast up a mound, and take a well-fortified city. The forces of the south won’t stand, neither will…
- Romans 11:26 (v6) and so all Israel will be saved. Even as it is written, “There will come out of Zion the Deliverer, and he will turn away ungodliness from…
- 2 Peter 3:7 (v6) But the heavens that exist now and the earth, by the same word have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and…
- 2 Samuel 18:27 (v7) The watchman said, “I think the running of the first one is like the running of Ahimaaz the son of Zadok.” The king said, “He is a good…
- Psalms 112:5 (v7) It is well with the man who deals graciously and lends. He will maintain his cause in judgment.
- Lamentations 1:6 (v6) All majesty has departed from the daughter of Zion. Her princes have become like deer that find no pasture. They have gone without strength…
- Jude 1:18 (v6) They said to you, “In the last time there will be mockers, walking after their own ungodly lusts.”
- 2 Samuel 23:14-17 (v7) David was then in the stronghold; and the garrison of the Philistines was then in Bethlehem. David longed, and said, “Oh that someone would…
40 distinct cross-references across this passage (43 total citations).
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6. For Christ, etc. I ventured not in my…
6. For Christ, etc. I ventured not in my version to allow myself so much liberty as to give this rendering, “In the time in which we were weak;” and yet I prefer this sense. An argument begins here, which is from the greater to the less, and which he afterwards pursues more at large: and though he has not woven the thread of his discourse so very distinctly, yet its irregular structure does not disturb the meaning. “If Christ,” he says, “had mercy on the ungodly, if he reconciled enemies to his Father, if he has done this by the virtue of his death, much more easily will he save them when justified, and keep those restored to favor in the possession of it, especially when the influence of his life is added to the virtue of his death.” The time of weakness some consider to be that, when Christ first began to be manifested to the world, and they think that those are called weak, who were like children under the tuition of the law. I apply the expression to every one of us, and I regard that time to be meant, which precedes the reconciliation of each one with God. For as we are all born the children of wrath, so we are kept under that curse until we become partakers of Christ. And he calls those weak, who have nothing in themselves but what is sinful; for he calls the same immediately afterwards ungodly. And it is nothing new, that weakness should be taken in this sense. He calls, in 1 Corinthians 12:22, the covered parts of the body weak; and, in 2 Corinthians 10:10, he designates his own bodily presence weak, because it had no dignity. And this meaning will soon again occur. When, therefore, we were weak, that is, when we were in no way worthy or fit that God should look on us, at this very time Christ died for the ungodly: for the beginning of religion is faith, from which they were all alienated, for whom Christ died. And this also is true as to the ancient fathers, who obtained righteousness before he died; for they derived this benefit from his future death.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv6–8 A sure comfort in adversity, that our peace and…
A sure comfort in adversity, that our peace and quietness of conscience be not troubled: for he that so loved them that were of no strength, and while they were yet sinners, that he died for them, how can he neglect them being now sanctified and living in him?
In time fit and convenient, which the father hath appointed.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6 For when we were yet without strength, in…
6 For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.
Ver. 6. Christ died for] A sufficient evidence of God’s dearest and deepest love shed abroad in our hearts, as a most sweet ointment.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv6–8 Without strength; utterly unable to help or redeem ourselves.
Without strength; utterly unable to help or redeem ourselves.
In due time; some read it, according to the time, and refer this clause to the foregoing words, making this to be the sense: When we were weak in time past, or in the time of the law, before grace appeared, then Christ died, &c. Others rather refer it to the following words, and so our translation carries it, that in due time, i.e. in the fulness of time, as Gal 4:4, or in the time that was before decreed and prefixed by the Father. The Scripture every where speaks of a certain season or hour assigned for the death of Christ: see Mat 26:45; Joh 8:20; 12:27; 17:1.
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Christ died for the ungodly; i.e. for the sake, or instead of, such as were enemies to God, {as Rom 5:10} and so could deserve no such favour from him.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv6–8 In this verse, the apostle sets forth the efficacy…
In this verse, the apostle sets forth the efficacy of Christ’s love towards us before justification: He had a love towards us when we were sinners, which prevailed with him to die for sinners; When we were yet without strength, Christ died for the ungodly.
Note here, 1. Man’s condition by nature described, a state of enmity, ungodly; and a state of impotency, without strength. We were without strength, and so wanted help; ungodly and so refused help. Man is but an impotent and obstinate creature; without power to resist justice, and without affection to desire mercy: So weak, that he trembles at the appearance of a worm, and yet so wicked, that he lifts up his head against heaven. The state of unregeneracy is both a state of enmity and a state of impotency.
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Note, 2. The way and means found out for our recovery, the death of Christ; When we were yet without strength, Christ died for us, Though he found the whole race of mankind buried in the ruins of their lapsed state, yet he did not leave them so, but died for them.
Note, 3. The seasonableness of the means interposed for our recovery: It was in due time that Christ died; that is, in the fulness of time appointed by God the Father, and determined in his decree and purpose.
Here we may remark, That Christ came not in the beginning of time, in the infancy and morning of the world (though it was then promised that he should come) nor yet did he stay till the best period and end of time, but came as it were in the middle of time, which is called the fulness of time, and here due time Gal 4:4. Christ came not for our recover as soon as ever we were fallen, that mankind might be the more sensible of the badness of their condition: Had we been instantly apprehended the danger of our disease, nor esteemed the kindness of our Physician: Neither did he stay till the last period and end of time before he came, that the faith and expectation of his church might not be put upon too long and severe an exercise: The patriarchs believed in Christ that was to come; the apostles in Christ then present; and Christians now believe in him that long since did come, and is gone again. So that the apostle might well say here, That in due time Christ died.
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v6 The apostle here describes the fountain and foundation of…
The apostle here describes the fountain and foundation of justification, laid in the death of the Lord Jesus. The streams are very sweet, but, if you run them up to the spring-head, you will find it to be Christ's dying for us; it is in the precious stream of Christ's blood that all these privileges come flowing to us: and therefore he enlarges upon this instance of the love of God which is shed abroad. Three things he takes notice of for the explication and illustration of this doctrine: - 1. The persons he died for, Rom 5:6-8. 2. The precious fruits of his death, Rom 5:9-11. 3. The parallel he runs between the communication of sin and death by the first Adam and of righteousness and life by the second Adam, Rom 5:12, to the end.
I. The character we were under when Christ died for us.
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1. We were without strength (Rom 5:6), in a sad condition; and, which is worse, altogether unable to help ourselves out of that condition - lost, and no visible way open for our recovery - our condition deplorable, and in a manner desperate; and, therefore our salvation is here said to come in due time. God's time to help and save is when those that are to be saved are without strength, that his own power and grace may be the more magnified, Deu 32:36. It is the manner of God to help at a dead lift,
2. He died for the ungodly; not only helpless creatures, and therefore likely to perish, but guilty sinful creatures, and therefore deserving to perish; not only mean and worthless, but vile and obnoxious, unworthy of such favour with the holy God. Being ungodly, they had need of one to die for them, to satisfy for guilt, and to bring in a righteousness. This he illustrates (Rom 5:7, Rom 5:8) as an unparalleled instance of love; herein God's thoughts and ways were above ours. Compare Joh 15:13, Joh 15:14, Greater love has no man. (1.) One would hardly die for a righteous man, that is, an innocent man, one that is unjustly condemned; every body will pity such a one, but few will put such a value upon his life as either to hazard, or much less to deposit, their own in his stead. (2.) It may be, one might perhaps be persuaded to die for a good man, that is, a useful man, who is more than barely a righteous man. Many that are good themselves yet do but little good to others; but those that are useful commonly get themselves well beloved, and meet with some that in a case of necessity would venture to be their antipsuchoi - would engage life for life, would be their bail, body for body. Paul was, in this sense, a very good man, one that was very useful, and he met with some that for his life laid down their own necks, Rom 16:4. And yet observe how he qualifies this: it is but some that would do so, and it is a daring act if they do it, it must be some bold venturing soul; and, after all, it is but a peradventure. (3.) But Christ died for sinners (Rom 5:8), neither righteous nor good; not only such as were useless, but such as were guilty and obnoxious; not only such as there would be no loss of should they perish, but such whose destruction would greatly redound to the glory of God's justice, being malefactors and criminals that ought to die. Some think he alludes to a common distinction the Jews had of their people into tsaddim - righteous, chesedim - merciful (compare Isa 57:1), and rashim - wicked. Now herein God commended his love, not only proved or evidenced his love (he might have done that at a cheaper rate), but magnified it and made it illustrious. This circumstance did greatly magnify and advance his love, not only put it past dispute, but rendered it the object of the greatest wonder and admiration: "Now my creatures shall see that I love them, I will give them such an instance of it as shall be without parallel." Commendeth his love, as merchants commend their goods when they would put them off. This commending of his love was in order to the shedding abroad of his love in our hearts by the Holy Ghost. He evinces his love in the most winning, affecting, endearing way imaginable. While we were yet sinners, implying that we were not to be always sinners, there should be a change wrought; for he died to save us, not in our sins, but from our sins; but we were yet sinners when he died for us. (4.) Nay, which is more, we were enemies (Rom 5:10), not only malefactors, but traitors and rebels, in arms against the government; the worst kind of malefactors and of all malefactors the most obnoxious. The carnal mind is not only an enemy to God, but enmity itself, Rom 8:7; Col 1:21. This enmity is a mutual enmity, God loathing the sinner, and the sinner loathing God, Zac 11:8. And that for such as these Christ should die is such a mystery, such a paradox, such an unprecedented instance of love, that it may well be our business to eternity to adore and wonder at it. This is a commendation of love indeed. Justly might he who had thus loved us make it one of the laws of his kingdom that we should love our enemies.
II. The precious fruits of his death.
1. Justification and reconciliation are the first and primary fruit of the death of Christ: We are justified by his blood (Rom 5:9), reconciled by his death, Rom 5:10. Sin is pardoned, the sinner accepted as righteous, the quarrel taken up, the enmity slain, an end made of iniquity, and an everlasting righteousness brought in. This is done, that is, Christ has done all that was requisite on his part to be done in order hereunto, and, immediately upon our believing, we are actually put into a state of justification and reconciliation. Justified by his blood. Our justification is ascribed to the blood of Christ because without blood there is no remission Heb 9:22. The blood is the life, and that must go to make atonement. In all the propitiatory sacrifices, the sprinkling of the blood was of the essence of the sacrifice. It was the blood that made an atonement for the soul, Lev 17:11.
2. Hence results salvation from wrath: Saved from wrath (Rom 5:9), saved by his life, Rom 5:10 When that which hinders our salvation is taken away, the salvation must needs follow. Nay, the argument holds very strongly; if God justified and reconciled us when we were enemies, and put himself to so much charge to do it, much more will he save us when we are justified and reconciled. He that has done the greater, which is of enemies to make us friends, will certainly the less, which is when we are friends to use us friendly and to be kind to us. And therefore the apostle, once and again, speaks of it with a much more. He that hath digged so deep to lay the foundation will no doubt build upon that foundation. - We shall be saved from wrath, from hell and damnation. It is the wrath of God that is the fire of hell; the wrath to come, so it is called, Th1 1:10. The final justification and absolution of believers at the great day, together with the fitting and preparing of them for it, are the salvation from wrath here spoken of; it is the perfecting of the work of grace. - Reconciled by his death, saved by his life. His life here spoken of is not to be understood of his life in the flesh, but his life in heaven, that life which ensued after his death. Compare Rom 14:9. He was dead, and is alive, Rev 1:18. We are reconciled by Christ humbled, we are saved by Christ exalted. The dying Jesus laid the foundation, in satisfying for sin, and slaying the enmity, and so making us salvable; thus is the partition-wall broken down, atonement made, and the attainder reversed; but it is the living Jesus that perfects the work: he lives to make intercession, Heb 7:25. It is Christ, in his exaltation, that by his word and Spirit effectually calls, and changes, and reconciles us to God, is our Advocate with the Father, and so completes and consummates our salvation. Compare Rom 4:25 and Rom 8:34. Christ dying was the testator, who bequeathed us the legacy; but Christ living is the executor, who pays it. Now the arguing is very strong. He that puts himself to the charge of purchasing our salvation will not decline the trouble of applying it.
3. All this produces, as a further privilege, our joy in God, Rom 5:11. God is now so far from being a terror to us that he is our joy, and our hope in the day of evil, Jer 17:17. We are reconciled and saved from wrath. Iniquity, blessed be God, shall not be our ruin. And not only so, there is more in it yet, a constant stream of favours; we not only go to heaven, but go to heaven triumphantly; not only get into the harbour, but come in with full sail: We joy in God, not only saved from his wrath, but solacing ourselves in his love, and this through Jesus Christ, who is the Alpha and the Omega, the foundation-stone and the top-stone of all our comforts and hopes - not only our salvation, but our strength and our song; and all this (which he repeats as a string he loved to be harping upon) by virtue of the atonement, for by him we Christians, we believers, have now, now in gospel times, or now in this life, received the atonement, which was typified by the sacrifices under thee law, and is an earnest of our happiness in heaven. True believers do by Jesus Christ receive the atonement. Receiving the atonement is our actual reconciliation to God in justification, grounded upon Christ's satisfaction. To receive the atonement is, (1.) To give our consent to the atonement, approving of, and agreeing to, those methods which Infinite Wisdom has taken of saving a guilty world by the blood of a crucified Jesus, being willing and glad to be saved in a gospel way and upon gospel terms. (2.) To take the comfort of the atonement, which is the fountain and the foundation of our joy in God. Now we joy in God, now we do indeed receive the atonement, Kauchōmenoi - glorying in it. God hath received the atonement (Mat 3:17; Mat 17:5; Mat 28:2): if we but receive it, the work is done.
III. The parallel that the apostle runs between the communication of sin and death by the first Adam and of righteousness and life by the second Adam (Rom 5:12, to the end), which not only illustrates the truth he is discoursing of, but tends very much to the commending of the love of God and the comforting of the hearts of true believers, in showing a correspondence between our fall and our recovery, and not only a like, but a much greater power in the second Adam to make us happy, than there was in the first to make us miserable. Now, for the opening of this, observe,
1. A general truth laid down as the foundation of his discourse - that Adam was a type of Christ (Rom 5:14): Who is the figure of him that was to come. Christ is therefore called the last Adam, Co1 15:45. Compare Co1 15:22. In this Adam was a type of Christ, that in the covenant-transactions that were between God and him, and in the consequent events of those transactions, Adam was a public person. God dealt with Adam and Adam acted as such a one, as a common father and factor, root and representative, of and for all his posterity; so that what he did in that station, as agent for us, we may be said to have done in him, and what was done to him may be said to have been done to us in him. Thus Jesus Christ, the Mediator, acted as a public person, the head of all the elect, dealt with God for them, as their father, factor, root, and representative - died for them, rose for them, entered within the veil for them, did all for them. When Adam failed, we failed with him; when Christ performed, he performed for us. Thus was Adam tupos tou mellontos - the figure of him that was to come, to come to repair that breach which Adam had made.
2. A more particular explication of the parallel, in which observe,
(1.) How Adam, as a public person, communicated sin and death to all his posterity (Rom 5:12): By one man sin entered. We see the world under a deluge of sin and death, full of iniquities and full of calamities. Now, it is worth while to enquire what is the spring that feeds it, and you will find it to be the general corruption of nature; and at what gap it entered, and you will find it to have been Adam's first sin. It was by one man, and he the first man (for if any had been before him they would have been free), that one man from whom, as from the root, we all spring. [1.] By him sin entered. When God pronounced all very good (Gen 1:31) there was no sin in the world; it was when Adam ate forbidden fruit that sin made its entry. Sin had before entered into the world of angels, when many of them revolted from their allegiance and left their first estate; but it never entered into the world of mankind till Adam sinned. Then it entered as an enemy, to kill and destroy, as a thief, to rob and despoil; and a dismal entry it was. Then entered the guilt of Adam's sin imputed to posterity, and a general corruption and depravedness of nature. Eph' hō - for that (so we read it), rather in whom, all have sinned. Sin entered into the world by Adam, for in him we all sinned. As, Co1 15:22, in Adam all die; so here, in him all have sinned; for it is agreeable to the law of all nations that the acts of a public person be accounted theirs whom they represent; and what a whole body does every member of the same body may be said to do. Now Adam acted thus as a public person, by the sovereign ordination and appointment of God, and yet that founded upon a natural necessity; for God, as the author of nature, had made this the law of nature, that man should beget in his own likeness, and so the other creatures. In Adam therefore, as in a common receptacle, the whole nature of man was reposited, from him to flow down in a channel to his posterity; for all mankind are made of one blood (Act 17:26), so that according as this nature proves through his standing or falling, before he puts it out of his hands, accordingly it is propagated from him. Adam therefore sinning and falling, the nature became guilty and corrupt, and is so derived. Thus in him all have sinned. [2.] Death by sin, for death is the wages of sin. Sin, when it is finished, brings forth death. When sin came, of course death came with it. Death is here put for all that misery which is the due desert of sin, temporal, spiritual, eternal death. If Adam had not sinned, he had not died; the threatening was, In the day thou eatest thou shall surely die, Gen 2:17. [3.] So death passed, that is, a sentence of death was passed, as upon a criminal, diēlthen - passed through all men, as an infectious disease passes through a town, so that none escape it. It is the universal fate, without exception: death passes upon all. There are common calamities incident to human life which do abundantly prove this. Death reigned, Rom 5:14. He speaks of death as a mighty prince, and his monarchy the most absolute, universal, and lasting monarchy. None are exempted from its sceptre; it is a monarchy that will survive all other earthly rule, authority, and power, for it is the last enemy, Co1 15:26. Those sons of Belial that will be subject to no other rule cannot avoid being subject to this. Now all this we may thank Adam for; from him sin and death descend. Well may we say, as that good man, observing the change that a fit of sickness had made in his countenance, O Adam! what hast thou done?
Further, to clear this, he shows that sin did not commence with the law of Moses, but was in the world until, or before, that law; therefore that law of Moses is not the only rule of life, for there was a rule, and that rule was transgressed, before the law was given. It likewise intimates that we cannot be justified by our obedience to the law of Moses, any more than we were condemned by and for our disobedience to it. Sin was in the world before the law; witness Cain's murder, the apostasy of the old world, the wickedness of Sodom. His inference hence is, Therefore there was a law; for sin is not imputed where there is no law. Original sin is a want of conformity to, and actual sin is a transgression of, the law of God: therefore all were under some law. His proof of it is, Death reigned from Adam to Moses, Rom 5:14. It is certain that death could not have reigned if sin had not set up the throne for him. This proves that sin was in the world before the law, and original sin, for death reigned over those that had not sinned any actual sin, that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, never sinned in their own persons as Adam did - which is to be understood of infants, that were never guilty of actual sin, and yet died, because Adam's sin was imputed to them. This reign of death seems especially to refer to those violent and extraordinary judgments which were long before Moses, as the deluge and the destruction of Sodom, which involved infants. It is a great proof of original sin that little children, who were never guilty of any actual transgression, are yet liable to very terrible diseases, casualties, and deaths, which could by no means be reconciled with the justice and righteousness of God if they were not chargeable with guilt.
(2.) How, in correspondence to this, Christ, as a public person, communicates righteousness and life to all true believers, who are his spiritual seed. And in this he shows not only wherein the resemblance holds, but, ex abundanti, wherein the communication of grace and love by Christ goes beyond the communication of guilt and wrath by Adam. Observe,
[1.] Wherein the resemblance holds. This is laid down most fully, Rom 5:18, Rom 5:19.
First, By the offence and disobedience of one many were made sinners, and judgment came upon all men to condemnation. Here observe, 1. That Adam's sin was disobedience, disobedience to a plain and express command: and it was a command of trial. The thing he did was therefore evil because it was forbidden, and not otherwise; but this opened the door to other sins, though itself seemingly small. 2. That the malignity and poison of sin are very strong and spreading, else the guilt of Adam's sin would not have reached so far, nor have been so deep and long a stream. Who would think there should be so much evil in sin? 3. That by Adam's sin many are made sinners: many, that is, all his posterity; said to be many, in opposition to the one that offended, Made sinners, katestathēsan. It denotes the making of us such by a judicial act: we were cast as sinners by due course of law. 4. That judgment is come to condemnation upon all those that by Adam's disobedience were made sinners. Being convicted, we are condemned. All the race of mankind lie under a sentence, like an attainder upon a family. There is judgment given and recorded against us in the court of heaven; and, if the judgment be not reversed, we are likely to sink under it to eternity.
Secondly, In like manner, by the righteousness and obedience of one (and that one is Jesus Christ, the second Adam), are many made righteous, and so the free gift comes upon all. It is observable how the apostle inculcates this truth, and repeats it again and again, as a truth of very great consequence. Here observe, 1. The nature of Christ's righteousness, how it is brought in; it is by his obedience. The disobedience of the first Adam ruined us, the obedience of the second Adam saves us, - his obedience to the law of mediation, which was that he should fulfil all righteousness, and then make his soul an offering for sin. By his obedience to this law he wrought out a righteousness for us, satisfied God's justice, and so made way for us into his favour. 2. The fruit of it. (1.) There is a free gift come upon all men, that is, it is made and offered promiscuously to all. The salvation wrought is a common salvation; the proposals are general, the tender free; whoever will may come, and take of these waters of life. This free gift is to all believers, upon their believing, unto justification of life. It is not only a justification that frees from death, but that entitles to life. (2.) Many shall be made righteous - many compared with one, or as many as belong to the election of grace, which, though but a few as they are scattered up and down in the world, yet will be a great many when they come all together. Katastathēsontai - they shall be constituted righteous, as by letters patent. Now the antithesis between these two, our ruin by Adam and our recovery by Christ, is obvious enough.
[2.] Wherein the communication of grace and love by Christ goes beyond the communication of guilt and wrath by Adam; and this he shows, Rom 5:15-17. It is designed for the magnifying of the riches of Christ's love, and for the comfort and encouragement of believers, who, considering what a wound Adam's sin has made, might begin to despair of a proportionable remedy. His expressions are a little intricate, but this he seems to intend: - First, If guilt and wrath be communicated, much more shall grace and love; for it is agreeable to the idea we have of the divine goodness to suppose that he should be more ready to save upon an imputed righteousness than to condemn upon an imputed guilt: Much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace. God's goodness is, of all his attributes, in a special manner his glory, and it is that grace that is the root (his favour to us in Christ), and the gift is by grace. We know that God is rather inclined to show mercy; punishing is his strange work. Secondly, If there was so much power and efficacy, as it seems there was, in the sin of a man, who was of the earth, earthy, to condemn us, much more are there power and efficacy in the righteousness and grace of Christ, who is the Lord from heaven, to justify and save us. The one man that saves us is Jesus Christ. Surely Adam could not propagate so strong a poison but Jesus Christ could propagate as strong an antidote, and much stronger. 3. It is but the guilt of one single offence of Adam's that is laid to our charge: The judgment was ex henos eis katakrima, by one, that is, by one offence, Rom 5:16, Rom 5:17. Margin. But from Jesus Christ we receive and derive an abundance of grace, and of the gift of righteousness. The stream of grace and righteousness is deeper and broader than the stream of guilt; for this righteousness does not only take away the guilt of that one offence, but of many other offences, even of all. God in Christ forgives all trespasses, Col 2:13. 4. By Adam's sin death reigned; but by Christ's righteousness there is not only a period put to the reign of death, but believers are preferred to reign of life, Rom 5:17. In and by the righteousness of Christ we have not only a charter of pardon, but a patent of honour, are not only freed from our chains, but, like Joseph, advanced to the second chariot, and made unto our God kings and priests - not only pardoned, but preferred. See this observed, Rev 1:5, Rev 1:6; Rev 5:9, Rev 5:10. We are by Christ and his righteousness entitled to, and instated in, more and greater privileges than we lost by the offence of Adam. The plaster is wider than the wound, and more healing than the wound is killing.
IV. In the last two verses the apostle seems to anticipate an objection which is expressed, Gal 3:19, Wherefore then serveth the law? Answer, 1. The law entered that the offence might abound. Not to make sin to abound the more in itself, otherwise than as sin takes occasion by the commandment, but to discover the abounding sinfulness of it. The glass discovers the spots, but does not cause them. When the commandment came into the world sin revived, as the letting of a clearer light into a room discovers the dust and filth which were there before, but were not seen. It was like the searching of a wound, which is necessary to to the cure. The offence, paraptōma - that offence, the sin of Adam, the extending of the guilt of it to us, and the effect of the corruption in us, are the abounding of that offence which appeared upon the entry of the law. 2. That grace might much more abound - that the terrors of the law might make gospel-comforts so much the sweeter. Sin abounded among the Jews; and, to those of them that were converted to the faith of Christ, did not grace much more abound in the remitting of so much guilt and the subduing of so much corruption? The greater the strength of the enemy, the greater the honour of the conqueror. This abounding of grace he illustrates, Rom 5:21. As the reign of a tyrant and oppressor is a foil to set off the succeeding reign of a just and gentle prince and to make it the more illustrious, so doth the reign of sin set off the reign of grace. Sin reigned unto death; it was a cruel bloody reign. But grace reigns to life, eternal life, and this through righteousness, righteousness imputed to us for justification, implanted in us for sanctification; and both by Jesus Christ our Lord, through the power and efficacy of Christ, the great prophet, priest, and king, of his church.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For when we were yet without strength,.... The apostle…
For when we were yet without strength,.... The apostle having mentioned the love of God proceeds to give an instance, and which is a full proof and demonstration of it, which is, that
in due time Christ died for the ungodly. That Christ died is certain; the death of Christ was foretold in prophecy, typified by the sacrifices of slain beasts, was spoken of by himself, both before and since his death; his enemies have never denied it; and this was the sum of the ministry of the apostles, and is the great article of faith: and that the death of Christ is a singular instance of the love of God, is evident by considering the person that died, the Son of God in human nature, his own, his only begotten Son, his beloved Son; the concern which God had in it, by willing, ordering, and appointing it, awaking the sword of justice against him, not sparing him, but delivering him up for us all; also the nature, kind, and manner of his death, and particularly the persons for whom he died, here described: he "died for the ungodly"; not for himself, he had no sins of his own to die for, nor did he want any happiness to procure; nor for angels, but for men; and these not holy, just, and good men, but ungodly; and not as a mere martyr, or only by way of example to them, and so for their good; but as the Syriac version reads it, , "in the room", or "stead of the ungodly", as their surety to make satisfaction for their sins. The Jews have a notion of the Messiah's being a substitute, and standing in the place and stead of sinners; and they say (x),
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"that Aaron filled up the place of the first Adam, and was brought near in the room of him;''
which is true of Christ, the antitype of Aaron. On those words, "I will give a man for thee", Isa 43:4; the doctors (y) say,
"do not read Adam, but Edom; for when God removes the decree (or punishment) from a particular man, he provides for the attribute of justice in the room of the man that sinned, , "another man that comes from Edom";''
referring, as I think, to Isa 63:1. And this their character of ungodly shows, that not goodness in man, but love in God, was the moving cause of Christ's dying for them; and that the end of his dying was to atone for their ungodliness: and to illustrate the love of God the more towards them in this instance, they are said to be "without strength" at that time; being so enfeebled by sin, that they were not capable of fulfilling the law, of atoning for the transgressions of it, of redeeming themselves from slavery, of beginning and carrying on a work of holiness their hearts, nor indeed of doing one good thing. Add to all this, that Christ died for these persons in due time; in the most fit, proper, and convenient season to illustrate the love and grace of God; when man appeared both weak and wicked; when the weakness of the legal dispensation had been sufficiently evinced, and the wickedness of man, both among Jews and Gentiles, was at a very great height: or rather by "due time" is meant the "fulness of time", Gal 4:4; the time appointed in council by God, agreed to by Christ, and fixed in prophecy; before the departure of the sceptre from Judah, the destruction of the second temple, and at the close of Daniel's weeks.
(x) Tzeror Hammor, fol. 96. 1. & 97. 4. & 98. 3. (y) Tzeror Hammor, fol. 93. 4.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv6–8 How can we now doubt of God's love? For…
How can we now doubt of God's love? For when we were without strength - Either to think, will, or do anything good. In due time - Neither too soon nor too late; but in that very point of time which the wisdom of God knew to be more proper than any other. Christ died for the ungodly - Not only to set them a pattern, or to procure them power to follow it. It does not appear that this expression, of dying for any one, has any other signification than that of rescuing the life of another by laying down our own.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv6–8 Verse 6. For when we were yet without strength]…
Verse 6. For when we were yet without strength] The apostle, having pointed out the glorious state of the believing Gentiles, takes occasion to contrast this with their former state; and the means by which they were redeemed from it. Their former state he points out in four particulars; which may be applied to men in general.
I. They were ασθενεις, without strength; in a weak, dying state: neither able to resist sin, nor do any good: utterly devoid of power to extricate themselves from the misery of their situation.
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II. They were ασεβεις, ungodly; without either the worship or knowledge of the true God; they had not God in them; and, consequently, were not partakers of the Divine nature: Satan lived in, ruled, and enslaved their hearts.
III. They were αμαρτωλοι, sinners, Ro 5:8, aiming at happiness, but constantly missing the mark, which is the ideal meaning of the Hebrew חטא chata, and the Greek αμαρτανω. See this explained, Ge 13:13. And in missing the mark, they deviated from the right way; walked in the wrong way; trespassed in thus deviating; and, by breaking the commandments of God, not only missed the mark of felicity, but exposed themselves to everlasting misery.
IV. They were εχθροι enemies, Ro 5:10, from εχθος, hatred, enmity, persons who hated God and holiness; and acted in continual hostility to both. What a gradation is here!
1. In our fall from God, our first apparent state is, that we are without strength; have lost our principle of spiritual power, by having lost the image of God, righteousness and true holiness, in which we were created.
2. We are ungodly, having lost our strength to do good; we have also lost all power to worship God aright. The mind which was made for God is no longer his residence.
3. We are sinners; feeling we have lost our centre of rest, and our happiness, we go about seeking rest, but find none: what we have lost in losing God, we seek in earthly things; and thus are continually missing the mark, and multiplying transgressions against our Maker.
4. We are enemies; sin, indulged, increases in strength; evil acts engender fixed and rooted habits; the mind, every where poisoned with sin, increases in averseness from good; and mere aversion produces enmity; and enmity, acts of hostility, fell cruelty, c.: so that the enemy of God hates his Maker and his service is cruel to his fellow creatures; "a foe to God, was ne'er true friend to man;" and even torments his own soul! Though every man brings into the world the seeds of all these evils, yet it is only by growing up in him that they acquire their perfection-nemo repente fuit turpissimus-no man becomes a profligate at once; he arrives at it by slow degrees; and the speed he makes is proportioned to his circumstances, means of gratifying sinful passions, evil education, bad company, c., c. These make a great diversity in the moral states of men: all have the same seeds of evil-nemo sine vitiis nascitur-all come defiled into the world but all have not the same opportunities of cultivating these seeds. Besides, as God's Spirit is continually convincing the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment, and the ministers of God are seconding its influence with their pious exhortations, as the Bible is in almost every house, and is less or more heard or read by almost every person, these evil seeds are receiving continual blasts and checks, so that, in many cases, they have not a vigorous growth. These causes make the principal moral differences that we find among men though in evil propensities they are all radically the same.
That all the preceding characters are applied by some learned men to the Gentiles, exclusively as such, I am well aware; and that they may be all applied to them in a national point of view, there can be little doubt. But there are too many correspondences between the state of the modern Gentiles and that of the ancient Gentiles, to justify the propriety of applying the whole as fully to the former as to the latter. Indeed, the four particulars already explained point out the natural and practical state of every human being, previously to his regeneration by the grace and Spirit of God.
In due time Christ died for the ungodly.] This due or proper time will appear in the following particulars:-
1. Christ was manifested in the flesh when the world needed him most.
2. When the powers of the human mind had been cultivated to the utmost both in Greece and Rome, and had made every possible effort, but all in vain, to find out some efficient scheme of happiness.
3. When the Jews were in the lowest state of corruption, and had the greatest need of the promised deliverer.
4. When the fulness of the time came, foretold by the prophets.
5. When both Jews and Gentiles, the one from their jealousy, the other from their learning, were best qualified to detect imposture and to ascertain fact.
6. In a word, Christ came when his advent was most likely to promote its great object-glory to God in the highest, and peace and good will among men. And the success that attended the preaching of Christ and his apostles, together with the wide and rapid spread of the Gospel, all prove that it was the due time, κατα καιρον, the proper season; and that Divine wisdom was justified in fixing upon that time in preference to all others.
Died for the ungodly] υπερ ασεβων απεθανε, He died INSTEAD of the ungodly, see also Ro 5:8; so Lu 22:19. The body of Christ, το υπερ υμων διδομενον, which is given FOR you; i.e. the life that is laid down in your STEAD. In this way the preposition υπερ, is used by the best Greek writers.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On v6 Rom 5:6-8. For — How can we now doubt…
Rom 5:6-8. For — How can we now doubt of God’s love, since when we were without strength — Either to think, will, or do any thing good; were utterly incapable of making any atonement for our transgressions, or of delivering ourselves from the depth of guilt and misery into which we were plunged; in due time — Neither too soon nor too late, but in that very point of time which the wisdom of God knew to be more proper than any other; Christ died for the ungodly — For the sake, and instead of, such as were enemies to God, (Rom 5:10,) and could not merit any favour from him: that is, for Jews and Gentiles, when they were, as has been proved in the first three chapters, all under sin. Observe, reader, Christ not only died to set us an example, or to procure us power to follow it, but to atone for our sins; for it does not appear that this expression, of dying for any one, has any other signification than that of rescuing his life by laying down our own. “By the ungodly here, Mr. Locke understands Gentiles, as also by weak, sinners, enemies, &c. They are undoubtedly included; but it seems very inconsistent with the whole strain of the apostle’s argument in the preceding chapters, to confine it to them. Compare Rom 3:9-20; Rom 3:22-23; Rom 4:5; Rom 5:20. I therefore,” says Dr. Doddridge, “all along explain such passages in the most extensive sense; and think nothing in the whole New Testament plainer, than that the gospel supposes every human creature, to whom it is addressed, to be in a state of guilt and condemnation, and incapable of being accepted with God, any otherwise than through the grace and mercy which it proclaims. Compare Joh 3:16; Joh 3:36; Joh 5:24; 1Jn 3:14; Mar 16:15-16; Luk 24:47; and especially 1Jn 1:10, than which no assertion can be more positive and express.” For scarcely for a righteous, or rather, honest, just, and unblameable man — One who gives to all what is strictly their due; would one be willing to die — Though apprehended to be in the most immediate danger: yet for a good man — A kind, merciful, compassionate, bountiful man; peradventure some would even dare to die — Every word increases the strangeness of the thing, and declares even this to be something great and unusual. But God commendeth — Greek, συνιστησι, recommendeth. A most elegant and proper expression; for those are wont to be recommended to us who were before either unknown to, or alienated from us. In that while we were yet sinners — So far from being good, that we were not even just; and were not only undeserving of his favour, but obnoxious to wrath and punishment; Christ died for us — Died in our stead, that our guilt might be cancelled, and we brought into a state of acceptance with God.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For when ... - This opens a new view…
For when ... - This opens a new view of the subject, or it is a new argument to show that our hope will not make ashamed, or will not disappoint us. The first argument he had stated in the previous verse, that the Holy Spirit was given to us. The next, which he now states, is, that God had given the most ample proof that he would save us by giving his Son when we were sinners; and that he who had done so much for us when we were enemies, would not now fail us when we are his friends; Rom 5:6-10. He has performed the more difficult part of the work by reconciling us when we were enemies; and he will not now forsake us, but will carry forward and complete what he has begun.
We were yet without strength - The word used here ἀσθενῶν asthenōn is usually applied to those who are sick and feeble, deprived of strength by disease; Mat 25:38; Luk 10:9; Act 4:9; Act 5:15. But it is also used in a moral sense, to denote inability or feebleness with regard to any undertaking or duty. Here it means that we were without strength “in regard to the case which the apostle was considering;” that is, we had no power to devise a scheme of justification, to make an atonement, or to put away the wrath of God, etc. While all hope of man’s being saved by any plan of his own was thus taken away; while he was thus lying exposed to divine justice, and dependent on the mere mercy of God; God provided a plan which met the case, and secured his salvation. The remark of the apostle here has reference only to the condition of the race before an atonement is made. It does not pertain to the question whether man has strength to repent and to believe after an atonement is made, which is a very different inquiry.
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In due time - Margin “According to the time” κατὰ καιρὸν kata kairon. In a timely manner; at the proper time; Gal 4:4, “But when the fulness of time was come,” etc. This may mean,
(1) That it was a fit or proper time. All experiments had failed to save people. For four thousand years the trial had been made under the Law among the Jews: and by the aid of the most enlightened reason in Greece and Rome; and still it was in vain. No scheme had been devised to meet the maladies of the world, and to save people from death. It was then time that a better plan should be presented to people.
(2) It was the time fixed and appointed by God for the Messiah to come; the time which had been designated by the prophets; Gen 49:10; Dan 9:24-27; see Joh 13:1; Joh 17:1.
(3) It was a most favorable time for the spread of the gospel. The world was expecting such an event; was at peace; and was subjected mainly to the Roman power; and furnished facilities never before experienced for introducing the gospel rapidly into every land; see the notes at Mat 2:1-2.
For the ungodly - Those who do not worship God. It here means sinners in general, and does not differ materially from what is meant by the word translated “without strength;” see the note at Rom 4:5.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On v6 Why did Christ...die for the ungodly? He shews Christ’s…
Why did Christ...die for the ungodly? He shews Christ’s great mercy and love for mankind, that he would die for us, who were sinners, and consequently his enemies. How few are there that will lay down their lives for a just man, or for a just cause? --- Perhaps for a good man. That is, for another, who has been good to him, his friend or benefactor, we may find one that will expose or lay down his life. But Christ, in due time, appointed by the divine decree, died for sinners, for us all. And if we have been reconciled to God, and justified by his death; now being made the children of God, and his friends, we may with greater confidence hope to be saved. (Witham) --- The text of the Greek is as follows: For when we were weak, he gave us our Lord Jesus Christ to redeem us; shewing how much God loved us, to perform such stupendous acts of love in our behalf. But the reading of the Vulgate is conformable to St. Irenæus, (lib. iii. chap. 18.) and to the commentaries of this epistle, which have been published under the name of St. Ambrose, and St. Jerome. (Calmet) --- St. Augustine says, those whom the apostle first calls weak, he afterwards calls impious, hos dixit infirmos quos impios. (Ep. lix. ad Paulinum.) --- St. Jerome, and other fathers and commentators, explain the Greek text of this verse as follows: Scarcely would any one die for a just cause; for who would ever think of dying in defence of injustice? Others explain it thus: Scarcely a single man would die for one that was wicked and unjust: for we can hardly find a person ready to lay down his life for a good man; his friend and benefactor, who has been kind to him. (Calmet)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For when we were yet without strength--that is, powerless…
For when we were yet without strength--that is, powerless to deliver ourselves, and so ready to perish.
in due time--at the appointed season.
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Christ died for the ungodly--Three signal properties of God's love are here given: First, "Christ died for the ungodly," whose character, so far from meriting any interposition in their behalf, was altogether repulsive to the eye of God; second, He did this "when they were without strength"--with nothing between them and perdition but that self-originating divine compassion; third, He did this "at the due time," when it was most fitting that it should take place (compare Gal 4:4), The two former of these properties the apostle now proceeds to illustrate.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6. Without strength—Impotent to help ourselves; hopeless of salvation…
6. Without strength—Impotent to help ourselves; hopeless of salvation except from some aid without ourselves; powerless but by some gracious power from some foreign source; fully competent to our own ruin, but wholly incompetent to our own salvation. Such is depraved man apart from a gracious ability bestowed through the atonement.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6. For when, &c.] From this ver. to Rom_5:11…
6. For when, &c.] From this ver. to Rom_5:11 St Paul expands the words “the love of God.” He explains this love, as “poured out” by the Spirit, to be specially redeeming and justifying love.
without strength] Impotent to deliver ourselves from sin and judgment. The words are in contrast to the might of the Deliverer.
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in due time] That of the Eternal Purpose; “the fulness of the time;” Gal_4:4. See Mar_1:15.
Christ] In the Gr. this word has a slight emphasis, pointing to the wonder of such a Deliverer’s appearance.
died] Also emphatic by position. His death is both the supreme proof of Divine love and the supreme requirement of the Divine Law.
the ungodly] Better, us the ungodly. Same word as Rom_4:5, q. v. Here probably this intense word is used of all sinners as such; in view of the contrasted holiness of the Substitute, and also to suggest that the “impotence” of Rom_5:6 is not merely negative, but is the refusal (due to moral evil) truly to love the true God. See on Rom_8:7.
“For” = for the sake of. The special bearing of the Gr. preposition here used depends on the context. In itself it does not necessarily indicate “substitution in the place of,” “vicariousness.” But the illustration in Rom_5:7 at once suggests that idea; and the preposition neither compels nor excludes it.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv6–8 (6) For when we were yet . . .—The…
(6) For when we were yet . . .—The reading at the beginning of this verse is doubtful. The reading of the Vatican MS. is very attractive, “If at least,” “If, as we know to be the fact, Christ died,” &c. But, unfortunately, this has not much further external support. If we keep the common reading we must either translate “For, moreover,” or we may suppose that there is some confusion between two constructions, and the word translated “yet” came to be repeated.
Without strength.—Powerless to work out our own salvation.
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In due time.—Or, in due season. So the Authorised version, rightly. Just at the moment when the forbearance of God (Rom_3:25) had come to an end, His love interposed, through the death of Christ, to save sinners from their merited destruction.
For the ungodly.—The force of the preposition here is “for the benefit of,” not “instead of.” St. Paul, it is true, holds the doctrine of the vicarious sacrifice of Christ, but this is expressed by such terms as the “propitiation” of Rom_3:25, or the “offering, and sacrifice for us” of Eph_5:2, and especially the “ransom for all” of 1Ti_2:6, not by the use of the preposition.
(6-11) Exposition showing how the love of God comes to have this cogency. That love was evidenced in the death of Christ. And consider what that death was. It is rare enough for one man to die for another—even for a good man. Christ died not for good men, but for sinners, and while they were sinners. If then His death had the power to save us from punishment, it is an easy thing to believe that His life will lead us to glory.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv6, 8 For when we were yet without strength, in due…
For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet (literally, for) peradventure for the good man some would even dare to die. The general purport of ver. 7 is obvious, viz. to show how Christ"s death for the ungodly transcends all human instances of self-sacrifice for others. But the exact import of the language used is not equally plain. That of the first clause, indeed, and its connection with what precedes, presents no difficulty. The meaning is that Christ"s dying for the ungodly is a proof of love beyond what is common among men. The second clause seems to be added as a concession of what some men may perhaps sometimes be capable of. It is introduced by a second gar (this being the reading of all the manuscripts), which may be meant as exceptive, "I do not press this without exception," being understood. So Alford; and in this case the "yet" of the Authorized Version, or though, may give its meaning. Or it may be connected with moliv , thus: "Scarcely, I say, for there may possibly be cases," etc. But what is the distinction between dikaiou in the first clause and tou agayou in the second? Some interpreters say that there is none, the intention being simply to express the possibility of human self-sacrifice for one that is good or righteous in some rare cases. But the change of the word, which would, according to this view, be purposeless, and still more the insertion of the article before agayou , forbids this interpretation. One view is that tou agayou is neuter, meaning that, though for a righteous individual one can hardly be found to be willing to die, yet for the cause of good, for what a man regards as the highest good, or pro bone publico (it might be), such self-sacrifice may be possible; This view is tenable, though against it is the fact that death in behalf of persons is being spoken of all along. The remaining and most commonly accepted view is that by "the good man" (the article pointing him out generally as a well-known type of character) is meant the beneficent one who inspires attachment and devotion as opposed to one who is merely just. Cicero ("De Off.," 3:15) is quoted in support of this distinction between the words: "Si vir bonus is est qui prodest quibus potest, nemini nocet, recte justum virum, bonum non facile reperiemus." Tholuck quotes, as a Greek instance, Kuron anakalountev tothn ton (AElian, "Var. Histor.," 3:17). Possibly the term o agayov would have a well-understood meaning to the readers of the Epistle, which is not equally obvious to us.
Vers. 6-11. The love of God commended.
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It is a most remarkable phrase, this description which is given in the eighth verse, of God commending his own love. We have, indeed, in other portions of Scripture, the Divine Being represented as a heavenly Merchantman, setting forth the blessings of the gospel as a merchantman might set forth his wares. "He, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price." And again in the Book of Revelation, "I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed; ... and anoint thine eyes with eye-salve, that thou mayest see." But here God is represented as commending, not merely the blessings of the gospel, but his own love, to human observation and admiration. Yes; but this is for no selfish end. God"s object in commending his love to us is for our sakes. He sets it before us in all its matchless tenderness and grandeur, that by means of it he may melt our hearts. He sets it before us in all its attractive power, that he may draw our hearts to holiness and our souls to heaven. He sets it before us in order that we may yield ourselves to its influence, and that thus, by what Dr. Chalmers calls "the expulsive power of a new affection," sin and the love of it, with all its withering blight and fatal grasp, may be driven out of our natures.
I THE LOVE OF GOD IS COMMENDED BY ITS OBJECTS. We have set before us in these verses a description of those who are the objects of the love of God, as shown in the death of Jesus Christ his Son. Was it the angels that were the objects of God"s redeeming love? Was it for the angels that Jesus died? No. They did not need his death. Was it for the good men and women of the world that Jesus died? If it was only for the good, then the love of God would be very limited in its range, and the great mass of humanity would be still helpless and hopeless. But one perfectly good person it would be impossible to find. "All have sinned." Who, then, are the objects of the love of God? Just those very men and women of whom it is said that "there is none righteous, no, not one.
1. The apostle describes us as being in a state of helplessness. "When we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly" (ver. 6). Surely here is a commendation of God"s love. Very often in this world the weak are left to shift for themselves. But if any of us were left to our own unaided efforts, what would become of us? Are we not all glad, no matter how strong we are, of the assistance of others? if any of us were left to our own unaided efforts to get to heaven, which of us could hope to get there? The gospel is a gospel for the weak that is to say, for the very strongest of us, physically, morally, and spiritually. In regard to God and eternity, how weak we are in all these aspects! We cannot stay the hand of disease or death; we cannot in our own strength maintain a life of an unswerving moral standard; we cannot work out a salvation for ourselves. But listen to this message: "When we were yet without strength,... Christ died for us.
2. But God loves more than the weak. He loves the ungodly. "Christ died for the ungodly" (ver. 6). The word here used expresses the indifference of the human heart to spiritual things. "The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit." If God only loved those who turned to him of their own accord, who then could be saved? If any of us have an interest now in spiritual things, was it not because God, in his mercy, laid his hand upon us, and awakened our minds to serious thought about him and our own souls? If there are those who are godless, ungodly, any who have no interest in spiritual things, to whom God"s service is a weariness, let us say to them, "God loves even you." "Christ died for the ungodly.
3. But God goes a step lower than even the ungodly and indifferent. He goes down into the depths of sin. "While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us" (ver. 8). And not merely sinners, but enemies. "When we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son" (ver. 10). Here is the greatest of all commendations of the Divine lore. It was a love, not for the deserving, but for the undeserving; not for the obedient, but for the disobedient; not for the just, but for the unjust; not for his friends, but for his enemies. If you have ever tried to love your enemies, those who have done you an injury, you know how hard it is. But God loved his enemies those who had broken his Law and rejected his invitations God loved them so much that he gave his own Son to die for their salvation, in order that he might bring those who were his enemies to dwell for ever with himself. What a description it is of the objects of God"s love! "Without strength;" "ungodly;" "sinners;" "enemies." Surely this ought to be enough to commend the love of God to us. Surely, then, there is hope for the guiltiest. "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief." "In peace let me resign my breath, And thy salvation see; My sins deserve eternal death, But Jesus died for me.
II THE LOVE OF GOD IS COMMENDED BY ITS OPERATION.
1. On God"s side it involved sacrifice. God"s love did not exhaust itself in profession. It showed itself in action. It showed itself in the greatest sacrifice which the world has ever seen. That was a genuine love. How it must have grieved the Father to think of his own holy, innocent Son, being buffeted and scourged and crucified by the hands of wicked men, in the frenzy of their passion and hatred! What a sacrifice to make for our sakes, when God gave up his own Son to the death for us all! Herein is the proof of the reality of God"s love. Herein is its commendation to us. "Love so amazing, so Divine, Demands my soul, my life, my all.
2. And then look at the operation of this love on our side. Look at the results it produces in human hearts. "Hope maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us" (ver. 5). "And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement" (ver. 11). What confidence it produces, what holy calm, what peace, what hope, what joy for time and for eternity, when we know that God loves us! Oh! there is no power like it to sustain the human heart. Temptations lose their power to drag us down, when that love is bound around us like a lifebuoy. Hatred and malice cannot harm us, hidden in the secret of his presence. Sorrow and suffering can bring no despair, when the Father"s face is bending over us with his everlasting smile, and his arms are underneath us with their everlasting strength. His love is like a path of golden sunlight across the dark valley. "For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Thus God commends to us his love. He commends it to us by showing us our own condition what we are without it. He shows us the character of the objects of his love strength;" "ungodly;" "sinners;" "enemies." He shows us the operation of his love. He points us to the cross, and bids us measure there the height and depth of his marvellous love. He shows us the operation of his love in human hearts what peace, what confidence, what hope, what joy unspeakable and full of glory, it produces. For all these reasons it is a love worth yielding to. For all these reasons it is a love worth having. Christians should commend the love of God. A consistent Christian life is the best testimony to the power of the love of God. By loving even our enemies, by showing a spirit of unselfishness and self-sacrifice, let us commend to those around us the love of God. "When one that holds communion with the skies Has filled his urn where those pure waters rise, And once more mingles with us meaner things, "Tis e"en as if an angel shook his wings; Immortal fragrance fills the circuit wide That tells us whence his treasures are supplied? C.H.I.
Vers. 6-8. The great love.
The realization of the love of God in the Christian consciousness is the crowning Christian evidence; and it is the work of God himself by his Spirit. But a historical fact is used by the Spirit of God as the instrumentality of his work of love; and it is because we believe in the fact that we realize the love which gives us such a blessed life. Yes, "God commendeth his love toward us;" and the great fact of commendation is this, "Christ died for us.
I THE LOVE. We may never forget that it was because God loved us we were saved. The originating impulse to salvation was in him. Wrath and love were mingled, but the love strove so to act that the wrath should be put away. The claims of righteousness on account of sins that were past were strong; but what if, by a supreme self-sacrifice, he himself should meet those claims? Even so it was; thus God"s love worketh all in all.
II THE SELF-SACRIFICE. Some object to the doctrine of a vicarious atonement, that to punish the innocent for the guilty is not just. But here we behold God himself stooping to death for man! And may not love make such a sacrifice? Nay, this is the only sacrifice which true love can make to sacrifice itself. "God commendeth his own love toward us, in that Christ died for us." The son of a father, dearer than self: Abraham; William Tell. But such illustrations utterly fail; for God"s Son is indissolubly One with him the Communication of himself.
III THE SACRIFICE FOR SINNERS. Such love the great prototype of all self-sacrificing human love. There may be the sacrifice of husband for wife, of mother for child. But this, in a sense, is self for self; God"s was God for man. There may be more disinterested sacrifice: subject for monarch, friend for friend. Yes, there may be self-sacrifice even unto death "for a righteous man," "for the good man" there may be: "peradventure" "scarcely." But God"s love for the weak, for the ungodly, for sinners! For such as were averse from himself, transgressing the laws of holiness, impotent to attempt or desire the good for such he died! A love which not merely pitied the victims of weakness, but gave itself for those who were most repulsive in their love of sin, most unblushing in their hate of God: herein is love indeed! And such was his love to us, in Christ.
Our faith in him, then, must be a faith which shall never let go its hold, which shall trust unto the uttermost. Also, our love must be a reflex of his. Even for those who are most distasteful in their sin, a redeeming love must be felt and shown. T.F.L.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv6–7 For when we were yet without strength, in due…
Rom_5:6-12
For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.
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Without strength
Utter condemnation and loss lies in that little word not. Ungodly, or not godly, is to be strengthless, condemned, and lost.
I. By nature all men are ungodly. Ungodliness takes a great many forms.
1. In some it is lawlessness. It is seen in the breach of every Divine commandment.
(1) Idolatry is the sin of hundreds of thousands during every hour of time.
(2) Swearing and impiety load every gale.
(3) Sabbath breaking is, wherever there is a Sabbath to break.
(4) Parents are disobeyed and neglected.
(5) Murder: does it not come to our very doors, and shock the city with its terrors?
(6) Adultery: is not that one of the sins which is fed by our wealth and the artificial state of society? and is it not preying on the very vitals of the nations life?
(7) Dishonesty: Diogenes would still need his lantern in some places of the city and the world if he would find an honest man.
(8) False witness, slander: what society is free from these? What man or woman is safe from them?
(9) Covetousness: no man has anything which is not apt to be desired unlawfully by another. All these commandments are broken because men are ungodly. If men were godly they would see the excellency and the beauty of them. They do see this when they become godly.
2. But ungodliness may exist in strength where there is little or no outward violation of the commandments. A man may keep them all in the letter, and not one of them in the spirit; he may still have the carnal mind which is enmity against God. Suppose a child of yours were to forget your name, or to show indifference about you when named, or coldness and dislike, although veiled under the form of politeness, could anyone persuade you that all that was consistent with loving you? And is not God forgotten? Disliked? Treated like a stranger, like an enemy? Ungodliness--that is the great sin.
II. The affecting concomitant of this state of things.
1. Ungodliness brings of necessity many evils in its train, condemnation, banishment from God, the wild passions and the miseries of life, gloomy, dismal prospects; but perhaps the most affecting thing of all is moral paralysis, without strength.
2. The meaning is this--that there is in ungodly human nature no recuperative power, no blessed gracious recoil in itself, back again to goodness. We may look up, but we cannot rise. A tree may be bent almost to breaking, but in a day it is erect again. There are some trees which do more than recover! The prevalent winds in Mexico which split the plantains leaves and warp the mango tree, give the cocoanut tree a permanent inclination towards the winds. This result arises from the rebound of the stems after being bent by the wind. Did you ever hear of any man having such a spring in his own nature, that the more he was pressed down by evil the higher he would rise in goodness? Is not the process rather waxing worse and worse--going away backwards? Not liking, and liking less and less, to retain God in their knowledge.
3. Without strength--
(1) Of reason, to find the lost God.
(2) Of wisdom, to discover the right plan of life.
(3) Of conscience, to see and testify for true morality.
(4) Of will, to do the duty that is apparent.
(5) Of affection, which has all been squandered and lost, to love God even when He reveals Himself!
4. This is a very sad condition. If you saw a man who, by his self-will and over-confidence, had brought on himself some terrible disaster, you would yet pity him, and help him out of his difficulty. And do you think that God will not pity a whole world of immortal creatures made in His own image? True, He condemns. But He also sorrows, over our fall, and yearns for our salvation.
III. Seasonable interposition. In due time. As for everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under the heaven, so there was a ripe and full time for the manifestation of God in the flesh.
1. This manifestation was not made too soon. Suppose it had been made very soon after the fall, men might have said, We got more help than we needed--we were not fully proved--we had no chance to try our powers. If Christ had come sooner--
(1) The Jewish priests might have said, We are sent away from the altar too soon; perhaps the blood of bulls and of goats might take away sin in the end.
(2) The heathen philosophers might have said, We are superseded too soon. The World by wisdom might know God, if time were given.
(3) The great conquerors, Nimrod, Cyrus, Alexander, etc., might have said, as representing kings and all civil governments, and the whole doctrine of force in this world, The sceptre is wrested from us too soon; a few more battles and the world would have been one empire of far-stretching righteousness and peace. But no such protest was raised. They were all silent, priest, and sage, and conqueror.
2. The Divine interposition did not come too late.
(1) Not after the world had grown so old in sin that it had lost in its wanderings the very faculty of hearing the recalling voice.
(2) Not when even the salt of the earth, the chosen people, had lost their savour, worn out their own beliefs, and lost, as they might have done, the knowledge of God.
(3) Not when all the continents and islands of the earth were full, and no fresh tracts remained to be claimed and peopled by races baptized into a nobler faith. Not too soon, and not too late, but when the world was weary of waiting, like a sufferer worn out with a long sickness, in this due, full time, the Saviour came.
IV. He came to die.
1. The fountain and spring of our salvation is the death of Christ--
(1) One might have said when the angels sang, Unto you is born this day a Saviour,--that will be humiliation enough--will have virtue enough to save us. No; incarnation is the foundation fact, but something more must be built on it.
(2) Is life enough? Working, sleeping, passing up and down Nazareth for thirty years? No; this is not redemption. It brings us nearer to it, year by year. But life like this forever would not have saved us.
(3) Is teaching enough? No; that had great power, but was like Gods law: it made sin more exceeding sinful, but did not take it away.
(4) Would translations to heaven, then, have been enough? No; nothing will do but this.
2. Christ died for us, as our Ransom and Substitute, not merely for our benefit and advantage. All the explanations of this truth, with which we are familiar, have force in them, although they all come short of the great and blessed meaning. He died--
(1) To satisfy justice. Not only would it be impossible for God to save in any violation of that attribute, but men themselves could not (for their own moral nature would not allow it) accept a salvation that did not consist with the integrity and clearness of that attribute.
(2) To honour the Divine law, which is the visible strength and protection of the universe, the wall of heaven and earth.
(3) To procure for us a righteous forgiveness, a peace--calm, and deep, and pure--like the very peace of God.
(4) To cancel guilt, to cleanse us by His sacrificial blood.
(5) To express Divine grace and boundless favour.
3. And this great act is brought before us here, and everywhere, as the most wonderful proof that could be given of the love of God. In the whole course of human history there has been nothing like it (Rom_5:7). Who ever heard of anyone dying for a worthless man? But this is what God does. He commendeth, makes very conspicuous and great, His love to us, in sending Christ to die for us, while we were yet sinners. Take away the love; make the death only a great historical fact, necessary to the accomplishment of Gods purpose in the development of this world; make it a contrivance in moral government, and although it will still be an impressive fact, you have shorn it of its glory. It is no longer the loadstone that draws all hearts. The death without the love might still be the wonder of angels, and the political admiration of the universe, but would be no longer the joy and rest of humble souls. I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me. How? By the subtle, mysterious power of all-conquering love. Do you see it? Are you drawn by it? I long to lead you to the large and wealthy place, to which you have right and title. (A. Raleigh, D. D.)
Mans impotency to help himself out of his misery
I. The condition wherein we are by nature without strength. This will appear if you consider mans condition--
1. With respect to the law (Gal_3:10). Consider--
(1) The duty it exacts; universal, perpetual, perfect obedience. If man fails in one point, he is gone (Eze_18:4; Eze_20:11). Now if God should call us to an account for the most inoffensive day that ever we passed over, what would become of us? (Psa_130:3). So that we are without strength to conform to the laws requirements (chap. 8:3).
(2) The penalty it inflicts: Cursed is everyone.
(a) In all he hath (Deu_28:15-18).
(b) In all he doeth (Pro_21:27).
(c) For evermore (Mat_25:41). We are without strength, because we cannot satisfy the justice of God for one sin.
(3) Its operation. Consider how all this works.
(a) Sometimes it terrifies (Heb_2:15; Act_24:25).
(b) Sometimes it stupefies the conscience so that men grow senseless of their misery (Eph_4:19).
(c) Sometimes it irritates inbred corruption (Rom_7:9). As a dam makes a stream the more violent or as a bullock at the first yoking becometh the more unruly.
(d) Sometimes it breeds a sottish despair (Jer_18:12). It is the worst kind of despair, when a man is given up to his own hearts lust (Psa_81:12), and runs headlong in the way of destruction, without hope of returning. Thus as to the law man is helpless.
2. With respect to terms of grace offered in the gospel. This will appear--
(1) By those emphatic terms by which the case and cure of man are set forth.
(a) His case. He is born in sin (Psa_51:5), and things natural are not easily altered. He is greedy of sin (Job_15:16). Thirst is the most implacable appetite. His heart is a heart of stone (Eze_36:26), and deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked (Jer_17:9), and the New Testament is no more favourable than the Old. There you will find man represented as a child of wrath by nature (Eph_2:3), a servant of sin (Rom_6:17), alienated from God (Eph_4:18). An enemy to God (Rom_8:7), dead in trespasses and sins (Eph_2:1-5). Certainly man contributeth little to his own conversion: he cannot hunger and thirst after Christ that drinks in iniquity like water. If the Scripture had only said that man had accustomed himself to sin, and was not born in sin; that man was somewhat prone to iniquity, and not greedy of it, and did often think evil, and not continually; that man was somewhat obstinate, and not a stone, an adamant; if the Scripture had only said that man was indifferent to God, and not a professed enemy; if a captive of sin, and not a servant; if only weak, and not dead; if only a neuter, and not a rebel;--then there might be something in man, and the work of conversion not so difficult. But the Scripture saith the quite contrary.
(b) The cure. To remedy so great an evil requires an almighty power, and the all-sufficiency of grace; see, therefore, how conversion is described in Scripture. By enlightening the mind (Eph_1:18). By opening the heart (Act_16:14). God knocks many times by the outward means, and as one that would open a door--He tries key after key, but till He putteth His fingers upon the handles of the lock (Son_5:4-5), the door is not opened to Him. If these words are not emphatic enough, you will find conversion expressed by regeneration (Joh_3:3), resurrection (Eph_2:5), creation (Eph_2:10; 2Co_4:6; 2Co_5:17; Psa_51:10), victory (1Jn_4:4), the beating and binding of the strong man by one that is stronger than he (Luk_11:21-22).
(2) By those assertions whereby all power is denied to man to convert himself to God, or to do anything that is spiritually good. As when it is said he cannot know (1Co_2:14), believe (Joh_6:44), obey (Rom_8:7). Nay, to instance in single acts: he cannot think a good thought of himself (2Co_3:5), speak a good word (Mat_12:34), do anything (Joh_15:5). Surely, then, man is without strength, to turn himself to God. But here are objections--
(a) How can it stand with the mercy, justice, and wisdom of God to require of man what he cannot pay? Answer first--God doth not lose His right, though man hath lost his power; their impotency doth not dissolve their obligation; a drunken servant is a servant, and it is against all reason that the master should lose his right to command by the servants default. A prodigal debtor, that hath nothing to pay, yet is liable to be sued for the debt without any injustice. And shall not God challenge the debt of obedience from a debtor that is both proud and prodigal? Answer second--Our natural impotency is voluntary. We must not consider man only as impotent to good, but as delighting in evil: he will not come to God (Joh_5:40). Our impotency lies in our obstinacy, and so man is left without excuse. We refuse the grace that is offered to us, and by continuing in sin increase our bondage, our inveterate customs turning to another nature.
(b) If man be so altogether without strength, why do ye press him to the use of means? Answer--Though man cannot change himself, yet he is to use the means. First, that we may practically see our own weakness. Men think the work of grace is easy, till they put themselves upon a trial: the lameness of the arm is found in exercise. Whosoever sets himself in good earnest to get any grace, will be forced to cry for it before he hath done. When a man goes to lift up a piece of timber heavy above his strength, he is forced to call in help. Second, the use of the means we owe to God as well as the change of the heart. God, that hath required faith and conversion, hath required prayer, hearing, reading, meditating; and we are bound to obey, though we know not what good will come of it (Heb_11:8; Luk_5:5). Our great rule is, we are to do what He commandeth, and let God do what He will. Third, to lessen our guilt. For when men do not use the means, they have no excuse (Act_13:46; Mat_25:26). Fourth, it may be God will meet with us. It is the ordinary practice of His free grace so to do; and it is good to make trial upon a common hope (Act_8:22).
II. Some reasons God permits this weakness.
1. To exalt His grace.
(1) Its freeness; for God hath shut up all under the curse, that there may be no way of escape but by His mercy (Rom_11:32; Gal_3:22).
(2) Its power (Eph_1:19). When we consider it, we may wonder at it that ever such a change should be wrought in us that are so carnal, so obstinate (1Pe_2:9). It is indeed marvellous that ever we should get out of the prison of sin; more miraculous than Peters getting out of prison.
2. To humble the creature thoroughly by a sense of his own guilt, unworthiness, and nothingness (Rom_3:19).
Conclusion: The subject is of use--
1. To the unconverted--to be sensible of their condition, and mourn over it to God. Acknowledge the debt; confess your impotency; beg pardon and grace; and, in a humble sense of your misery, endeavour earnestly to come out of it. By such doctrines as these men are either cut at heart (Act_7:54) or pricked at heart (Act_2:37).
2. To press the converted to thankfulness. We were once in such a pitiful ease.
3. Let us compassionate others that are in this estate, and endeavour to rescue them. (T. Manton, D. D.)
A weak world made strong
I. The moral prostration of humanity. When we were yet without, not muscular or mental, but moral strength.
1. To effect the deliverance of self. The souls of all were carnal, sold under sin. Man, the world over, felt this profoundly for ages. His cry was--O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me? etc. Philosophers, priests, poets, tried to deliver the soul, but failed.
2. To render acceptable service to the Creator. Wherewithal shall we come before the Lord, and how shall we bow before the Most High God?
3. To face the future with calmness. Deep in the hearts of all men was the belief in a future life, but that future rose before them in aspects so terrible that they recoiled from it. No weakness so distressing as this; moral powerlessness is not only a curse, but a crime. Yet all unregenerate men are the subjects of this lamentable prostration.
II. The reinvigorating power of Christs death. In due time Christ died for the ungodly. Christs death enables man--
1. To deliver himself. It generates within him a new spiritual life, by which he throws off its enthrallments as the winged chrysalis its crust. Christs death is the life of souls.
2. To render acceptable service to God. It presents to him--
(1) The right motive.
(2) The right method.
3. To calmly face the future. Christs death reveals a bright future, and furnishes the means for attaining it. Christs death is the moral power of the world. It inspires men with love--love is power; with faith--faith is power; with hope--hope is power; with courage--courage is power.
III. The seasonable period of the redeemers mission. In due time, i.e.
1. When the world was prepared to appreciate it. Mankind had tried every means they could invent to deliver themselves from the power of sin, to attain the approval of their Maker, and to win a bright future, but had failed. Four thousand years of earnest philosophisings and sacerdotal labour, legislative enactments, and moral teachings, had signally failed. The world by wisdom knew not God. The intellect of Judaea, Greece, Rome, all failed. The world was prostrate in hopelessness.
2. The time appointed by Heaven. The time had been designated by the prophets (Gen_49:10; Dan_9:27; Joh_17:1).
3. The time most favourable for the universal diffusion of the fact.
(1) There was a general expectation of a Great Deliverer.
(2) The world was at peace, and mainly under the control of one government--Rome.
(3) The Greek language was all but universally spoken.
(4) Communications were opened up between all the villages, towns, and cities of the world. In due time Christ died. (D. Thomas, D. D.)
For whom did Christ die
?--The human race is here described as a sick man in an advanced stage of disease; no power remains in his system to throw off his mortal malady, nor does he desire to do so. Your condition is not only your calamity, but your fault. Other diseases men grieve about, but you love this evil which is destroying you. While man is in this condition Jesus interposes for his salvation.
I. The fact. Christ died for the ungodly,
1. Christ means Anointed One, and indicates that He was commissioned by supreme authority. Jesus was both set apart to this work and qualified for it by the anointing of the Holy Ghost. He is no unauthorised, no amateur deliverer, but one with full credentials from the Father.
2. Christ died. He did a great deal besides dying, but the crowning act of His career of love, and that which rendered all the rest available, was His death. This death was--
(1) Real, as proved by the piercing of His side, and His burial.
(2) Acute. My God, My God, why, etc.
(3) Penal; inflicted upon Him by Divine justice; and rightly so, for on Him lay our iniquities, and therefore on Him must lie the suffering.
(4) Terrible. Condemned to a felons gibbet, He was crucified amid a mob of jesters.
3. Christ died, not for the righteous, but for the ungodly, or the godless, who, having cast off God, cast off with Him all love for that which is right. He did not please Himself with some rosy dream of a superior race yet to come, when civilisation would banish crime, and wisdom would conduct man back to God. Full well He knew that, left to itself, the world would grow worse and worse. This view was not only the true one, but the kindly one; because had Christ died for the better sort, then each troubled spirit would have inferred. He died not for me. Had the merit of His death been the perquisite of honesty, where would have been the dying thief? If of chastity, where the woman that loved much? If of courageous fidelity, how would it have fared with the apostles, who all forsook Him and fled? Then, again, in this condition lay the need of our race that Christ should die. To what end could Christ have died for the good? The just for the unjust I can understand; but the just dying for the just were a double injustice.
II. Plain inferences from this fact.
1. That you are in great danger. Jesus would not interpose His life if there were not solemn need and imminent peril. The Cross is the danger signal to you, it warns you that if God spared not His only Son, He will not spare you.
2. That out of this danger only Christ can deliver the ungodly, and He only through His death. If a less price than that of the life of the Son of God could have redeemed men, He would have been spared. If, then, God spared not His Son, but freely delivered Him up for us all, there must have been a dread necessity for it.
3. That Jesus died out of pure pity, because the character of those for whom He died could not have attracted Him. God commendeth His love towards us in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.
4. That the ungodly have no excuse if they do not come to Him, and believe in Him unto salvation. Had it been otherwise they might have pleaded, We are not fit to come. But you are ungodly, and Christ died for the ungodly, why not for you?
5. That the converted find no ground of boasting; for they were ungodly, and, as such, Christ died for them.
6. That saved ones must not think lightly of sin. If God had forgiven sinners without an atonement they might have done so, but now that pardon comes through the bitter griefs of their Redeemer they cannot but see it to be an exceeding great evil.
7. This fact is the grandest argument to make the ungodly love Christ when they are saved.
III. The proclamation of this fact.
1. In this the whole Church ought to take its share. Shout it, or whisper it; print it in capitals, or write it in a large hand. Speak it solemnly; it is not a thing for jest. Speak it joyfully; it is not a theme for sorrow. Speak it firmly; it is an indisputable fact. Speak it earnestly; for if there be any truth which ought to arouse all a mans soul it is this. Speak it where the ungodly live, and that is at your Own house. Speak it also in the haunts of debauchery. Tell it in the gaol; and sit down at the dying bed and read in a tender whisper--Christ died for the ungodly.
2. And you that are not saved, take care that you receive this message. Believe it. Fling yourself right on to this as a man commits himself to his life belt amid the surging billows. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The sad plight and the sure relief
I. The condition of those for whom Christ died.
1. They were without strength.
(1) Legally. Before Gods bar man had a weak case.
(a) We could not deny the charge that we had broken the law.
(b) We could not set up an alibi.
(c) We could not make apologies, for we have sinned wilfully, repeatedly, without any necessity, with divers aggravations, deliberately and presumptuously, when we knew the penalty. So weak was our case that no advocate who understood it would have ventured to plead it, except that one glorious Advocate who pleaded it at the cost of His own life.
(2) Morally. We are so weak by nature that we are swayed by every influence which assails us. At one time man is driven by fashion; at another he is afraid of his fellow men. Then the evil spirit comes upon him, or if the devil should let him alone, his own heart suffices. The pomp of this world, the lust of the eye, the pride of life--any of these things will drive men about at random. Nothing seems to be too wicked, too insane, for mankind. Man is morally weak--a poor, crazy child. He has lost that strong hand of a well-trained perfect reason which God gave him at the first.
(3) Spiritually. When man disobeyed he died spiritually. The blessed Spirit left him. Man is dead in sin. He cannot rise to God any more than the dead in the grave can come out of their sepulchres of themselves and live.
2. They were ungodly, i.e., men without God. God is not--
(1) In their thoughts.
(2) In their hearts. If they do remember Him, they do not love Him.
(3) In their fears.
(4) In their hopes. Christ came to save the very vilest of the vile.
II. When Christ interposed to save us. In due time, i.e., at a proper period. There was no accident about it. Sin among mankind in general had reached a climax.
1. There never was a more debauched age. It is impossible to read chap. 1. without feeling sick at the depravity it records. Their own satirists said that there was no new vice that could be invented. Even Socrates and Solon practised vices which I dare not mention in any modest assembly. But it was when man had got to his worst that Christ was lifted up to be a standard of virtue--to be a brazen serpent for the cure of the multitudes who everywhere were dying of the serpents bites.
2. Christ came at a time when the wisdom of man had got to a great height. Philosophers were seeking to dazzle men with their teaching, but the bulk of their teaching was foolishness, couched in paradoxical terms to make it look like wisdom. The world by wisdom knew not God.
3. But, surely, man had a religion! He had; but the less we say about it the better. Holy rites were acts of flagrant sin. The temples were abominable, and the priests were abominable beyond description. And where the best part of man, his very religion, had become so foul, what could we expect of his ordinary life? But was there not a true religion in the world somewhere? Yes, but among the Jews tradition had made void the law of God, and ritualism had taken the place of spiritual worship. The Pharisee thanked God that he was not as other men were, when he had got in his pocket the deeds of a widows estate of which he had robbed her. The Sadducee was an infidel. The best men of the period in Christs days said, Away with such a fellow from the earth! Now, it was when men had got to this pitch that Christ came to die for them. If He had launched His thunderbolts at them, or swept the whole race away, none could have blamed Him. But, instead of that, the pure and Holy One came down to earth Himself to die, that these wretches--yea, that we ourselves--might live through Him.
III. What did he do for us?
1. He made the fullest degree of sacrifice that was possible. He made the heavens, and yet He lay in Bethlehems manger. He hung the stars in their places, and laid the beams of the universe, and yet became a carpenters son; and then when He grew up He consented to be the servant of servants. When at last He gave His life, It is finished, said He; self-sacrifice had reached its climax; but He could not have saved us if He had stopped short of that.
2. In the fact that Christs self-sacrifice went so far I see evidence of the extreme degree of our need. Would He, who is God over all, blessed forever, have come from the height of heaven and have humbled Himself even to the death, to save us, if it had not been a most terrible ruin to which we were subject?
3. This death of Christ was the surest way of our deliverance. The just dies for the unjust, the offended Judge Himself suffers for the offence against His own law.
IV. What then?
1. Then sin cannot shut any man out from the grace of God if he believes. The man says, I am without strength. Christ died for us when we were without strength. The man says, I am ungodly. Christ died for the ungodly.
2. Then Jesus will never cast away a believer for his after sins, for if when we were without strength He died for us, if, when we were ungodly, He interposed on our behalf, will He leave us now that He has made us godly (Rom_1:10)?
3. Then every blessing any child of God can want he can have. He that spared not His own Son when we were without strength and ungodly, cannot deny us inferior blessings now that we are His own dear children.
4. Then how grateful we ought to be! (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Glorying in God
I. Gods love to us. Note--
1. The condition in which it found us. We were--
(1) Without strength. Let this be viewed as--
(a) Moral impotence; and is it not true that we were unable to do that which is good? When we wished to do it, we could not will it. We felt ourselves captives of the devil, sold and bound under sin.
(b) Helplessness in the time of danger; and is it not true that we were without strength to defend ourselves against the condemnation of the law, and the righteous anger of Jehovah?
(2) Ungodly, that is, destitute of true righteousness. We were not only weak, but unwilling to do good.
(3) Sinners; transgressors of Gods law in act and deed. Being corrupt trees, we brought forth evil fruit.
(4) Enemies to God. We did not love Him, or care for Him. Nay, we insulted Him, fought against Him, silently or violently, and so lived as to counteract and oppose all His purposes, so far as we had the power.
2. What that love has done for us. When we were in this state of helplessness and rebellion against God, He gave His Son to die for us. By that death believers are justified and reconciled to God.
3. The comparison of this love with the behaviour of men to each other (Rom_1:7-8). The righteous man is a man of correct and irreproachable behaviour; but the good man is a man of generosity and kindness, who wins the hearts of his friends, and for whom friends have been willing to die. But for a merely just man, you would scarcely find any willing to lay down his life; while certainly for the base and mean of mankind, or for his personal enemies, no man has been found willing to die. But God commendeth His love toward us in that, while we were wickedly His enemies, He gave His Son to die for us.
4. That this love was manifested in due time (Mar_1:15; Gal_4:4; and Eph_1:10). This time seems to have been determined by the stage arrived at in history when mans utter helplessness was fully demonstrated. Many centuries were allowed for the world to exhaust every device, to accomplish its own moral renovation. War and peace had been tried, together with every possible form of civil government. Philosophy and science, civilisation and religion, literature and art, had been carried sufficiently far to prove how utterly powerless they all were to accomplish the end designed. It was impossible for anyone to say, If He had waited a little longer, we should have found out some other plan, and been able to do without Him. How this enhances our conception of Gods love! He patiently tarried to see what mankind could achieve for themselves; and He beheld them at length entirely helpless, hopeless of self-restoration, and callously indifferent to the interposition of Heaven, Then it was that God sent His Son to die for the ungodly.
II. Our hope in God. Look at--
1. The salvation of which we are so sure. It is a salvation from wrath; and it is a salvation to heaven (Rom_1:9).
2. The grounds of this confidence. The apostle argues from the greater difficulty to the less. For--
(1) We were reconciled when enemies; how much more, being now the friends of God, shall we enjoy the full blessings of His grace?
(2) We were saved from guilt by His death; how much more shall we be sanctified and prepared for heaven by Him living for us.
III. Our glorying in God. If such be our apprehension of Gods love to us, and such the confidence of our hope and trust in Him for the future, it is not hard to see how we must joy, or rather make our boast in Him through Jesus Christ, by whom this blessedness of reconciliation with God has been secured. Think of--
1. The greatness of our heavenly Friend. In nature how noble! In attributes how august!
2. His goodness. Many rejoice in the friendship of the great and powerful, while they cannot boast of the goodness and integrity of their patrons. But here it is permitted us to glory in the perfect rectitude and moral loveliness of Him in whose name we make our boast.
3. His riches. We might have a kind and good friend, whose ability to help us might fall far short of his disposition. But it is not so with God.
4. His love. The great ones of the earth bestow their friendship on inferiors in a cold and meagre manner. But God gives us and shows us all His heart.
5. His purposes concerning us. It is impossible to exaggerate the value of the good things which He hath prepared for them that love Him.
Conclusion:
1. How happy should believers be, rejoicing, as they are privileged to do, with a joy unspeakable and full of glory.
2. How humble, when they remember their unworthiness, and their inability to render back any sufficient return to God.
3. How holy and diligent in their endeavour to walk worthily of so high a calling, and so great a Friend.
4. How thankful, when they consider what they owe unto God.
5. How ready to praise Him for all His goodness toward them.
6. How willing to trust Him with all the issues of their salvation in the time to come.
The certainty of the believers final redemption
The apostle establishes this point by means of two reasons--
I. The great love which God has already bestowed on man. This is seen in--
1. The unworthiness of the object.
(1) Without strength. In this expression the apostle is probably accommodating himself to the natural disposition of the Romans. Rome was a mighty empire, and its motto was power. Their highest notion of goodness, as the word virtue indicates, was strength. Hence Paul represents the gospel as the power of God. Nothing was so detestable in their eyes as weakness. And what a helpless man was in the estimation of the Roman, that--universal man--was in the sight of God. There was nothing to evoke the Divine complacency, but everything to repel.
(2) Ungodly. There was not only the destitution of what was holy, but also the absence of desire for any good.
(3) Sinners. When God is banished from the thought, as suggested by the word ungodly, His place is usurped by unworthy rivals. The higher principles of the soul are made subordinate to the lower. Disorder prevails; and to God, who in the beginning commanded the chaotic earth to wear its present aspect of beauty, nothing could be more repelling than the huge disorder reigning in the human soul bent on fulfilling the desires of the flesh.
(4) Enemies. Here the apostle reaches the climax of his reasoning. All the unworthiness of man must be attributed to his enmity against God. In this man is a sad exception to everything else Which God has made. In nature, Gods will and power are coextensive. But man disobeys and resists his Maker. The very power which was given him to hate sin is so perverted that it is used against God Himself.
2. The greatness of Christs sacrifice. With reverence we would say, that to redeem man was not easy even to God. It required an infinite sacrifice to remove the curse connected with sin. And for this purpose God spared not His own Son. Now, if God bestowed such an incomparable love upon man when he was without strength, ungodly, sinful, and inimical towards Him, surely He will not withhold any blessing from man when he is reconciled to Him, and adopted to His family again.
II. What Christs life in heaven is doing, contrasted with what His death has done.
1. However important we may regard the death of our Lord, we must not consider His life in heaven of secondary moment. Apart from this life His death would not avail us. But the apostle asserts that the death of Christ effected our reconciliation to God. And shall we doubt the power of His life? Nay; the good work which He hath begun on our behalf will be fully consummated.
2. Besides, the nature of Christs work in heaven is a pledge for the final safety of the believer, He liveth to make intercession for us. His intercession is the completion of His sacrifice, and perpetuates the efficacy of His atonement. (H. Hughes.)
Christs vicarious death
One of the most hopeless cases ever brought into the Moyamensing Prison in Philadelphia, U.S., was a negress, who was convicted of a crime of violence. She was a huge, fierce animal, who had been born and had lived in the slums of Alaska Street. She was a drunkard and dissolute from childhood. The chaplain, after she had been under his charge for six months, shook his head hopelessly and passed by her cell without a word. One day the matron, taking a bunch of scarlet flowers from her hat, threw them to Deb carelessly, with a pleasant word or two. The woman started in astonishment, and then thanked her earnestly. The next day the matron saw the flowers, each leaf straightened and smoothed, pinned up on the wall of the cell. Deb, in a gentle voice, called attention to them, praised their beauty, and tried, in her clumsy way, to show the pleasure they had given her. That woman, said the matron to the chaplain, has the rarest of all good qualities. She is grateful. There is one square inch of good ground in which to plant your seed. The matron herself planted the seed. Every day she showed some little kindness to the poor, untamed creature, who was gradually softened and subdued simply by affection for this, her first friend, whom she followed like a faithful dog: By and by, the matron took her as a helper in the ward, a favour given only to the convicts whose conduct deserved reward. The matrons hold upon the woman grew stronger each day. At last she told her the story of the Saviours love and sacrifice. Deb listened with wide, eager eyes. He died for me--me! she said. The matron gave up her position, but when Deb was discharged she took her into her house as a servant, trained, taught her, cared for her body and soul, always planting her seeds in that one inch of good ground. Deb is now a humble Christian. He died for me, was the thought which lightened her darkened soul. (American Youths Companion.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6–11. For when we were without strength. Were powerless…
6–11. For when we were without strength. Were powerless to save ourselves. In due time. In God's own chosen time. Christ died for the ungodly. For sinners. He came to save, not the righteous, but to “save his people from their sins.”
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On vv6–7 Rom_5:6.—ἀσθεν indicates man’s necessity, ἁσεβ his unworthiness.
CRITICAL NOTES
Rom_5:6.—ἀσθεν indicates man’s necessity, ἁσεβ his unworthiness.
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MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Rom_5:6
The fourfold aspect of Christ’s work.—Death is always a solemn event, and casts its dark shadows over the spirit. A silent dread holds the soul in check when one enters the chamber where the good man meets his fate. The solemn importance of all deaths is surpassed by the solemn importance of the death of the Son of God. When Jesus died the earth was clothed in darkness and the heavens in mourning stood.
“He dies! the Friend of sinners dies;
Lo! Salem’s daughters weep around;
A solemn darkness veils the skies,
A sudden trembling shakes the ground.”
It must have been an awe-inspiring event, for we read, “Now when the centurion saw what was done, he glorified God, saying, Certainly this was a righteous man. And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts and mourned.” The death of Christ opens up a large view of divine purposes. It was the climax of the Saviour’s earthly mission, and this was the culminating crisis of eternal counsels and of time’s preceding movements. And this sixth verse appears to open up a fourfold aspect of the Saviour’s work and mission.
I. Out of the powerless comes power.—From the weak and powerless stock of humanity came Jesus, travailing in the greatness of His strength, mighty to save. The first Adam went from strength to weakness; the Second Adam went from the weakness of humanity to the might of saving grace. How was this? It was because divine strength incarnated itself in human weakness. When we were without strength, unable either to serve God aright or to save ourselves, Jesus Christ appeared to our rescue and our salvation. From Adam to Christ was a descending scale; from Christ to the close of time shall be an ascending scale. If men are to be developed out of their weakness and into noble creatures, it must be along the Christ line. The true and only satisfactory evolutionary force of humanity’s upward rising is the Christ of gospel history. Christ by His death inspired healing strength into a race weakened by moral sickness.
II. Into the darkness comes light.—In due time, in the God-appointed time, in the world’s needy time, when its moral darkness was dense and thick, the Sun of righteousness arose with healing in His wings. Men of light and of sweetness had been allowed plenty of scope. Philosophy and culture had no reason to complain of overhaste in the divine interposition. All had tried, and failure was the result. Light merged into darkness; sweetness became bitterness. The culture of the Greeks was no bulwark against the inroads of moral corruption. The power of the Romans could not withstand the conquering and desolating force of moral evil. Few were the stars that glimmered in the midnight sky. Are our modern men of light and sweetness mightier than the Platos and Senecas of the past? Into the darkness the light shone, and no wonder that a darkness so dense could not comprehend the light. But soon it began to feel the benign influence, and the foul forms of darkness cowered and fled swiftly away as the divine light increased.
III. Out of death comes life.—The law of nature and the law of grace. The seed dies. The golden harvest waves over the plain. Life springs out of death throughout all God’s world. Calvary is the epitome of the universe, with this difference—that from Calvary’s death scene there camo spiritual life. All life promoted by Christ’s death. This is to be judged by its tendency and purpose. This is to promote and preserve:
1. New physical life, and this should be more largely realised in the future than in the past. Modern science feels the impulse of the beneficent influence of Christianity, and modern science is making towards the prolongation of human existence. Modern science has worked to the incentive of deadly instruments of war, but Christianity shall work till no gunboats shall sail on earth’s broad rivers and seas.
2. Intellectual life. Since Christ’s death there has been a general increase of intellectual life, and this has been specially noticeable in countries where a pure Christianity has prevailed. There have been dark ages, but out of the darkness arose greater light—a backward flow, but the ocean of intellectual life has been moving forward, and the gracious ozone has benefited mankind.
3. Spiritual life. This has been the special outcome of Christ’s death. Science and philosophy can scarcely be said to have attempted the enterprise. The pleasures of art and the charms of music may produce spasmodic resemblances, but only the death of Christ can generate the mysterious and blessed force we call spiritual life. Out of Christ’s death has come, and is coming, the life of the redeemed—multitudinous life from this one Man’s death. Will the vast plains of a renovated world be sufficiently ample to receive that great multitude who enjoy spiritual life? God’s spacious heavens with their many mansions must be provided. Death shall die. Tombs shall cease. Life must be finally victorious. The death of Christ shall be universally triumphant, for out of it spiritual life shall everywhere flourish, and its pulsations will make the universe throb with joy unspeakable.
IV. Out of and into the impious comes holiness.—“If any man be in Christ, he is a new creation: old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” We are in Christ as we are crucified with Him. In His death we share by faith, and through it we become new creations. Righteousness is both imputed and imparted to the believer. Opposing men may talk as they please, but it is a certain fact that the Christian religion, both in its true and false forms, has produced a purer morality, a higher tone of life, than any other religious system the world has seen. Notwithstanding all drawbacks, our England to-day is better and nobler than ever. Is not crime diminishing? Is not education spreading? Is there not consideration for the poor, the outcast, for the sick, and even for animals, which has never been before witnessed, and which is the glory of our times? The awful loss of the Victoria in Mediterranean waters has this compensation—that it teaches the spirit of chivalry is not dead. Let infidelity and agnosticism roll back the sweet waters of Christianity, and we shall soon have to weep and lament over a country where dire desolation would sweep with destructive force. Christ’s death begins in darkness and brightens out into glorious light. Darkness covers the earth when He dies. Light irradiates the earth when by His death He conquers death. Angels in white are sitting on earth’s tombs, and they are changed into palaces of beauty and of delights. Spiritual life abounds. No more need the cypress tree be planted. Angelic rapture was increased when it was seen that out of Christ’s death spiritual life would arise. Fresh anthems of praise rolled along the golden streets. Louder notes of thanksgiving rose up to the splendid vaults of heaven’s many mansions. Christ died for the ungodly, and angels then looked to this world and saw it lit up with the glow of divine love and blessedness; they saw its deserts rejoice and blossom as the rose, and its wildernesses made exceeding glad. Christ died for the ungodly, and angels saw dead men come forth from their many tombs, cast on one side the graveclothes, and assume the garments of the living and the blessed. Angels and good men have most splendid expectations. Christ died for the ungodly. Blessed thought! None need be excluded. Christ by His death delivers mankind from the power and thraldom of sin. Let us evermore rejoice in this fact—that “when we were without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.”
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON Rom_5:6
The certainty of the believer’s final redemption.—There is nothing so great as to be entirely independent, nothing so small as not to be of some service. The sweetest promises of God are ours in times of sadness. These Christians at Rome stood in need of encouragement to continue steadfast in their devotedness to the Saviour. It was natural for them to give way to doubts, and almost to think they could never be expected to reach heaven at last, much less to become “more than conquerors,” when they gazed upon the worldly pomp of their persecutors and remembered the power with which they seemed to be invested. But the apostle bids them remember what God had already done for them. “For when we were without strength, … much more then being justified,” etc. And the apostle establishes this point by means of two reasons:—
I. The great love which God has already bestowed on man.—It is interesting to observe how the apostle illustrates this. He refers:
1. To the unworthiness of man as the object of it. In all positions he appears utterly undeserving of the benign influence of God.
(1) “Without strength.” In this expression the apostle is probably accommodating himself to the natural disposition of the Romans. Their highest notion of goodness, as the word “virtue” indicates, was power or strength. Hence the apostle represents the gospel to these people as “the power of God.” Nothing was so detestable in their eyes as weakness. And what a weak, helpless man was in the estimation of the Romans, that man, universal man, was in the sight of God—“without strength.”
(2) “Ungodly.” This designation presents man in another aspect. True, man in every age had been searching after God; but if the virtue of any act or desire lies in the motive which prompts it, then man’s quest in search of God was not pure and right. Man’s character as presented by the word “ungodly” shows him to be unworthy of the divine complacency.
(3) “Sinner.” This presents man in another aspect. When God is banished from the thought as suggested by the word “ungodly,” His place is usurped by unworthy rivals. The higher principles of the soul are made subordinate to the lower.
(4) “Enemy.” With this word the apostle reaches the climax of his reasoning. Man’s enmity to God lies at the root of all his wickedness, and in this man is a sad exception to everything else which God has made. Everything else in nature yields implicit obedience to God. But man disobeys his Maker. The very power which was given him to hate sin is so perverted that it is used against God Himself.
2. The greatness of God’s love to man is shown also by the sacrifice which He made to redeem him. “Christ died for the ungodly.” With reverence we would say that to redeem man was not easy even to God. As one great author remarks, “This [sin] is great in the sight of God. The whole creation is counted as but a very little thing, but the evil of sin is great. It required an infinite sacrifice to remove the curse connected with it.” “While we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” Oh, wondrous love!
II. The certainty of the believer’s final redemption is argued also from what Christ’s life in heaven is doing contrasted with what His death has done.—However important we may regard the death of Christ, we must not consider his life—we mean His life in heaven—of secondary moment. Apart from this life His death would not avail us. But the apostle asserts that the death of Christ affected our reconciliation to God. This mighty change was wrought by the death of Christ. And shall we doubt the power of His life? Besides, the nature of Christ’s work in heaven is a pledge for the final safety of the believer. Christ’s intercession bears the same relation to His death as Providence does to creation. God created, and now sustains; Christ died, and now intercedes.—Hugh Hughes.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 5
Rom_5:6. Kazainak, the robber chieftain.—Kazainak was a robber chieftain inhabiting the mountains of Greenland. He came to a hut where the missionary was translating the Gospel of St. John. He wanted to know what he was doing; and when the missionary told him how the marks he was making were words, and how the book could speak, he wished to hear what it said. The missionary then read the story of Christ’s suffering and death, when the chieftain immediately asked, “What has this man done? Has He robbed anybody? Has He murdered anybody?” “No,” was the reply; “He has robbed no one, murdered no one; He has done nothing wrong.” “Then why does He suffer Why does He die?” “Listen,” said the missionary; “this man has done nothing wrong, but Kazainak has done wrong. This man has not robbed any one, but Kazainak has robbed many. This man has murdered none, but Kazainak has murdered his brother, Kazainak has murdered his child. This man suffered that Kazainak might not suffer; He died that Kazainak might not die.” “Tell me the story again,” said the astonished chieftain; and the hard-hearted murderer was brought to the foot of the cross.
Rom_5:6. Debt prevents work.—Once there was an artisan who laboured in the service of a rich Eastern master. Imprudently the man had got into immense debt with an unmerciful creditor, who told him that unless he settled accounts before the close of the year he and his family would be sold as slaves. It was impossible to pay the debt. Meanwhile his master noticed that his work was falling off every week. It was not so cleverly done as before. The weekly account of labour which he produced was lessened. One day he spoke about this to the steward. “Why, sir,” the steward replied, “that poor fellow cannot possibly make good work. He cannot manage his tools, for his hands tremble. Nor can he see well what he is doing, for his eyes are filled with tears. A heavy debt is pressing upon him, and until it is paid he will not be able to do one good piece of work.” “Tell him that I have paid his debt,” said the generous master. The steward went and delivered the message. From that moment fresh vigour was put into the man. His hands trembled no more, nor were his eyes dim with tears. He swung the hammer with a will, and his little dwelling rang with merry songs, and he did his work better and quicker than formerly. A parable of our state. Sin paralyses our moral energies. We are weak. The debt is heavy. We cannot pay; but Christ discharges the debt. We are set at liberty and placed on a new vantage ground. We may run the heavenly course without fainting, and walk without weariness.
Rom_5:6. A father dies for his son.—In the French revolution a young man was condemned to the guillotine and shut up in one of the prisons. He was greatly loved by many, but there was one who loved him more than all put together. How know we this? It was his own father; and the love he bore his son was proved in this way: When the lists were called, the father, whose name was exactly the same as the son’s, answered to the name, and the father rode in the gloomy tumbril out to the place of execution, and his head rolled beneath the axe instead of his son’s, a victim to mighty love. See here an image of the love of Christ to sinners; for thus Jesus died for the ungodly.—Spurgeon.
Rom_5:6-8. “None of them died for me.”—Interest in the lepers, those special objects of the Saviour’s help, has been greatly revived of late, and attention is justly drawn to the noble deeds wrought by Protestant missionaries in India. The Rev. Dr. Bowman, of the Church Missionary Society, was enabled to erect a place of worship in connection with the Calcutta Leper Asylum, and an aged woman, over eighty-two years old, was there led by the preacher to the divine Healer. A sceptic asked her if the many gods and goddesses of her own religion would not suffice; but she had an answer ready for him: “None of them died for me.”—Henry Proudfoot.
Christ’s sacrifice for sinners.—In the early ages of the Christian Church many slaves were carried prisoners out of Italy into Africa. Paulinus, Bishop of Nola, redeemed many of them, until at last his fortune was exhausted. One day a poor widow came and besought him to recover an only son who had been carried away captive. Being unable to ransom him with money, Paulinus sailed for Africa and induced the prince whose slave the young man was to set him free and take himself in exchange. The bishop performed the duties of slave so faithfully that the prince grew attached to him, and on learning his rank gave him not only his own liberty, but that of his fellow-countrymen who were in bondage.—W. H. Hatch.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On vv6–8 6. “For we being yet without strength, yet in…
6. “For we being yet without strength, yet in due time Christ died for us:
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v8
Romans
WHAT PROVES GOD’S LOVE
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Rom 5:8.
We have seen in previous sermons on the preceding context that the Apostle has been tracing various lines of sequence, all of which converge upon Christian hope. The last of these pointed to the fact that the love of God, poured into a heart like oil into a lamp, brightened that flame; and having thus mentioned the great Christian revelation of God as love, Paul at once passes to emphasise the historical fact on which the conviction of that love rests, and goes on to say that ‘the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us, for when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly.’ Then there rises before him the thought of how transcendent and unparalleled a love is that which pours its whole preciousness on unworthy and unresponsive hearts. He thinks to himself-’We are all ungodly; without strength-yet, He died for us. Would any man do that? No! for,’ says he, ‘it will be a hard thing to find any one ready to die for a righteous man-a man rigidly just and upright, and because rigidly just, a trifle hard, and therefore not likely to touch a heart to sacrifice; and even for a good man, in whom austere righteousness has been softened and made attractive, and become graciousness and beneficence, well! it is just within the limits of possibility that somebody might be found even to die for a man that had laid such a strong hand upon his affections. But God commendeth His love in that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.’ Now, when Paul says ‘commend,’ he uses a very significant word which is employed in two ways in the New Testament. It sometimes means to establish, or to prove, or to make certain. But ‘prove’ is a cold word, and the expression also means to recommend, to set forth in such a way as to appeal to the heart, and God does both in that great act. He establishes the fact, and He, as it were, sweeps it into a man’s heart, on the bosom of that full tide of self-sacrifice.
So there are two or three points that arise from these words, on which I desire to dwell now-to lay them upon our hearts, and not only upon our understandings. For it is a poor thing to prove the love of God, and we need that not only shall we be sure of it, but that we shall be softened by it. So now let me ask you to look with me, first, at this question-
I. What Paul thought Jesus Christ died for.
‘Died for us.’ Now that expression plainly implies two things: first, that Christ died of His own accord, and being impelled by a great motive, beneficence; and, second, that that voluntary death, somehow or other, is for our behoof and advantage. The word in the original, ‘for,’ does not define in what way that death ministers to our advantage, but it does assert that for those Roman Christians who had never seen Jesus Christ, and by consequence for you and me nineteen centuries off the Cross, there is benefit in the fact of that death. Now, suppose we quote an incident in the story of missionary martyrdom. There was a young lady, whom some of us knew and loved, in a Chinese mission station, who, with the rest of the missionary band, was flying. Her life was safe. She looked back, and saw a Chinese boy that her heart twined round, in danger. She returned to save him; they laid hold of her and flung her into the burning house, and her charred remains have never been found. That was a death for another, but ‘Jesus died for us’ in a deeper sense than that. Take another case. A man sets himself to some great cause, not his own, and he sees that in order to bless humanity, either by the proclamation of some truth, or by the origination of some great movement, or in some other way, if he is to carry out his purpose, he must give his life. He does so, and dies a martyr. What he aimed at could only be done by the sacrifice of his life. The death was a means to his end, and he died for his fellows. That is not the depth of the sense in which Paul meant that Jesus Christ died for us. It was not that He was true to His message, and, like many another martyr, died. There is only one way, as it seems to me, in which any beneficial relation can be established between the Death of Christ and us, and it is that when He died He died for us, because ‘He bare our sins in His own body on the tree.’
Dear brethren, I dare say some of you do not take that view, but I know not how justice can be done to the plain words of Scripture unless this is the point of view from which we look at the Cross of Calvary-that there the Lamb of Sacrifice was bearing, and bearing away, the sins of the whole world. I know that Christian men who unite in the belief that Christ’s death was a sacrifice and an atonement diverge from one another in their interpretations of the way in which that came to be a fact, and I believe, for my part, that the divergent interpretations are like the divergent beams of light that fall upon men who stand round the same great luminary, and that all of them take their origin in, and are part of the manifestation of, the one transcendent fact, which passes all understanding, and gathers into itself all the diverse conceptions of it which are formed by limited minds. He died for us because, in His death, our sins are taken away and we are restored to the divine favour.
I know that Jesus Christ is said to have made far less of that aspect of His work in the Gospels than His disciples have done in the Epistles, and that we are told that, if we go back to Jesus, we shall not find the doctrine which for some of us is the first form in which the Gospel finds its way into the hearts of men. I admit that the fully-developed teaching followed the fact, as was necessarily the case. I do not admit that Jesus Christ ‘spake nothing concerning Himself’ as the sacrifice for the world’s sins. For I hear from His lips-not to dwell upon other sayings which I could quote-I hear from His lips, ‘The Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister’-that is only half His purpose-’and to give His life a ransom instead of the many.’ You cannot strike the atoning aspect of His death out of that expression by any fair handling of the words.
And what does the Lord’s Supper mean? Why did Jesus Christ select that one point of His life as the point to be remembered? Why did He institute the double memorial, the body parted from the blood being a sign of a violent death? I know of no explanation that makes that Lord’s Supper an intelligible rite except the explanation which says that He came, to live indeed, and in that life to be a sacrifice, but to make the sacrifice complete by Himself bearing the consequences of transgression, and making atonement for the sins of the world.
Brethren, that is the only aspect of Christ’s death which makes it of any consequence to us. Strip it of that, and what does it matter to me that He died, any more than it matters to me that any philanthropist, any great teacher, any hero or martyr or saint, should have died? As it seems to me, nothing. Christ’s death is surrounded by tenderly pathetic and beautiful accompaniments. As a story it moves the hearts of men, and ‘purges them, by pity and by terror.’ But the death of many a hero of tragedy does all that. And if you want to have the Cross of Christ held upright in its place as the Throne of Christ and the attractive power for the whole world, you must not tamper with that great truth, but say, ‘He died for our sins, according to the Scriptures.’
Now, there is a second question that I wish to ask, and that is-
II. How does Christ’s death ‘commend’ God’s love?
That is a strange expression, if you will think about it, that ‘God commendeth His love towards us in that Christ died.’ If you take the interpretation of Christ’s death of which I have already been speaking, one could have understood the Apostle if he had said, ‘Christ commendeth His love towards us in that Christ died.’ But where is the force of the fact of a man’s death to prove God’s love? Do you not see that underlying that swift sentence of the Apostle there is a presupposition, which he takes for granted? It is so obvious that I do not need to dwell upon it to vindicate his change of persons, viz. that ‘God was in Christ,’ in such fashion as that whatsoever Christ did was the revelation of God. You cannot suppose, at least I cannot see how you can, that there is any force of proof in the words of my text, unless you come up to the full belief, ‘God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.’
Suppose some great martyr who dies for his fellows. Well, all honour to him, and the race will come to his tomb for a while, and bring their wreaths and their sorrow. But what bearing has his death upon our knowledge of God’s love towards us? None whatever, or at most a very indirect and shadowy one. We have to dig deeper down than that. ‘God commends His love . . . in that Christ died.’ ‘He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father.’ And we have the right and the obligation to argue back from all that is manifest in the tender Christ to the heart of God, and say, not only, ‘God so loved the world that He’ sent His Son, but to see that the love that was in Christ is the manifestation of the love of God Himself.
So there stands the Cross, the revelation to us, not only of a Brother’s sacrifice, but of a Father’s love; and that because Jesus Christ is the revelation of God as being the ‘eradiation of His glory, and the express image of His person.’ Friends! light does pour out from that Cross, whatever view men take of it. But the omnipotent beam, the all-illuminating radiance, the transforming light, the heat that melts, are all dependent on our looking at it-I do not only say, as Paul looked at it, nor do I even say as Christ looked at it, but as the deep necessities of humanity require that the world should look at it, as the altar whereon is laid the sacrifice for our sins, the very Son of God Himself. To me the great truths of the Incarnation and the Atonement of Jesus Christ are not points in a mere speculative theology; they are the pulsating vital centre of religion. And every man needs them in his own experience.
I was going to have said a word or two here-but it is not necessary-about the need that the love of God should be irrefragably established, by some plain and undeniable and conspicuous fact. I need not dwell upon the ambiguous oracles which-
‘Nature, red in tooth and claw,
With rapine’
gives forth, nor on how the facts of human life, our own sorrows, and the world’s miseries, the tears that swathe the earth, as it rolls on its orbit, like a misty atmosphere, war against the creed that God is love. I need not remind you, either, of how deep, in our own hearts, when the conscience begins to speak its not ambiguous oracles, there does rise the conviction that there is much in us which it is impossible should be the object of God’s love. Nor need I remind you how all these difficulties in believing in a God who is love, based on the contradictory aspects of nature, and the mysteries of providence, and the whisperings of our own consciousness, are proved to have been insuperable by the history of the world, where we find mythologies and religions of all types and gods of every sort, but nowhere in all the pantheon a God who is Love.
Only let me press upon you that that conviction of the love of God, which is found now far beyond the limits of Christian faith, and amongst many of us who, in the name of that conviction itself, reject Christianity, because of its sterner aspects, is historically the child of the evangelical doctrine of the Incarnation and sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And if it still subsists, as I know it does, especially in this generation, amongst many men who reject what seems to me to be the very kernel of Christianity-subsists like the stream cut off from its source, but still running, that only shows that men hold many convictions the origin of which they do not know. God is love. You will not permanently sustain that belief against the pressure of outward mysteries and inward sorrows, unless you grasp the other conviction that Christ died for our sins. The two are inseparable.
And now lastly-
III. What kind of love does Christ’s death declare to us as existing in God?
A love that is turned away by no sin-that is the thing that strikes the Apostle here, as I have already pointed out. The utmost reach of human affection might be that a man would die for the good-he would scarcely die for the righteous. But God sends His Son, and comes Himself in His Son, and His Son died for the ungodly and the sinner. That death reveals a love which is its own origin and motive. We love because we discern, or fancy we do, something lovable in the object. God loves under the impulse, so to speak, of His own welling-up heart.
And yet it is a love which, though not turned away by any sin, is witnessed by that death to be rigidly righteous. It is no mere flaccid, flabby laxity of a loose-girt affection, no mere foolish indulgence like that whereby earthly parents spoil their children. God’s love is not lazy good-nature, as a great many of us think it to be and so drag it in the mud, but it is rigidly righteous, and therefore Christ died. That Death witnesses that it is a love which shrinks from no sacrifices. This Isaac was not ‘spared.’ God gave up His Son. Love has its very speech in surrender, and God’s love speaks as ours does. It is a love which, turned away by no sin, and yet rigidly righteous and shrinking from no sacrifices, embraces all ages and lands. ‘God commendeth’-not ‘commended.’ The majestic present tense suggests that time and space are nothing to the swift and all-filling rays of that great Light. That love is ‘towards us,’ you and me and all our fellows. The Death is an historical fact, occurring in one short hour. The Cross is an eternal power, raying out light and love over all humanity and through all ages.
God lays siege to all hearts in that great sacrifice. Do you believe that Jesus Christ died for your sins ‘according to the Scriptures’ ? Do you see there the assurance of a love which will lift you up above all the cross-currents of earthly life, and the mysteries of providence, into the clear ether where the sunshine is unobscured? And above all, do you fling back the reverberating ray from the mirror of your own heart that directs again towards heaven the beam of love which heaven has shot down upon you? ‘Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and gave His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.’ Is it true of us that we love God because He first loved us?
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv6–8 For while we were yet weak, in due season…
For while we were yet weak, in due season Christ died for the ungodly .
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v7 See Rom 1:19 (See Scofield "Rom 10:10").
righteous
See Rom 1:19 (See Scofield "Rom 10:10").
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv6, 8 The word "we" here refers to all believers and…
we
The word "we" here refers to all believers and so should be inclusive. (See: Inclusive "We")
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For one will hardly die for a righteous man
"It is hard to find someone who is willing to die, even for a righteous man"
That is, perhaps someone would dare to die for a good person
"But you might find someone who is willing to die for such a good person"
translationWords
Christ
godly
righteous
good
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v6 5:6 At just the right time might mean that…
5:6 At just the right time might mean that God sent Christ at the time appointed in history, or that our condition as utterly helpless was the right time for God to demonstrate his love by sending his Son on our behalf.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.