04 Death Is Defeated: The Insane Hope of the Gospel

Krisan Marotta: This is the Wednesday in the Word podcast, and I'm Krisan Marotta. Thanks for downloading. Today we're finishing our series on what is the gospel, and we'll be looking at hope. What is the hope of a believer? You can find links and lecture notes related to today's talk on our website. You'll find those at wednesdayintheword.com slash gospel 4. Today we're going to be looking at Romans chapter 5, verses 1 through 11. In the other talks in this series, I haven't been looking at a specific passage, but rather summarizing ideas that are all taught in Romans chapters 1 through 4. But today we're going to switch gears a little bit and teach an actual passage. But before we get to that and before we start talking about hope, let me review where we've been so far. In the first week, we talked about life and death, and we defined death the way the New Testament uses it, as this phenomenon of human existence where everything physical and spiritual breaks down. So it's not just the end of biological viability, it is this whole process of decay, corruption, futility, where everything breaks down. Life is the exact opposite of that. It's something we don't have yet, but it is the promise of eternal life in the gospel. So it is a tendency toward good or enhancement in all of existence. And we saw that life automatically and inevitably flows from holiness, while death automatically and inevitably flows from sin. This is what Paul means in Romans 3 when he says the wages of sin are death. Death is a consequence of sin. God is the sole source of life because he alone can give holiness. When we rebelled, we cut ourselves off from this source of life or holiness and we became prisoners of sin and death. Then in our justification talk, we talked about how there were two consequences to our rebellion. First, we experienced sin and death, and the second is that the rebellion itself is wrong and deserves punishment. So it's not just that our rebellion was unfortunate, it's that it is wrong and we now owe a debt to justice. And justification is the forgiveness of that debt to justice which qualifies us once again to receive life. To be justified, then is to be in a position where God's justice has been satisfied. And we talked about how justification is a gift from God. It is made possible by the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ, and it is granted to those who have faith. Then on our third talk, we looked at faith. What is saving faith? What is that thing I must have to be in a position to be justified? And we defined faith as the permanent, ongoing trust in God that one day He will completely free me from all the consequences and effects of sin because of the blood of Jesus Christ. Saving faith itself is a gift of God, and we talked about how it has four aspects. First was a genuine desire for holiness in and of itself. The second, a genuine understanding that left to myself I am not capable of obtaining holiness. I can't overcome my own sin. I can't make myself righteous. Third, a genuine understanding that God owes me nothing, that He is not obligated to grant me any gift at all, and in fact I am unworthy of any gift from Him. And then finally, the fourth aspect is a firm trust that God both intends to and will in fact make me holy in the age to come because of what Jesus did for us. Well now we come to the question, so what? Why should we care? Is all of this just a theological argument? Is it academic? Is it something that I just need to understand to kind of pass a theology quiz or say I really truly get this Christian stuff? Or does it mean anything to me on a personal day-to-day level? And that's the question we're going to answer next because that's the question Paul answered in Romans. So by the end of Romans chapter four, Paul has finished making his case for the fact that we are justified by faith alone, that we're not justified by keeping the law or by being born Jewish or any other reason, we are justified by faith alone. And then he wraps up that introductory section of the letter in chapter five by answering the question, so what? Now that we're justified, what's the big deal? And what he says is we now have a reason to boast. And we're going to talk about what that means in a minute. Let me just read the first two verses of Romans five. This is the English Standard Version. Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. You'll notice this section begins with therefore. Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, so he's switching gears and he's answering the question, so what? What's the big deal about being justified? And the first thing he tells us is that we now have peace with God because of what Jesus did for us. Peace is used two ways in the New Testament. It is often used as a synonym for the Hebrew word shalom, meaning essentially eternal life or well being in the fullest sense of the word. But here I think Paul means the other meaning, and that is peace as opposed to war. We have peace with God as opposed to strife or hostility. We have peace as opposed to being under his wrath. So therefore, since we've been justified by faith, we have peace as opposed to strife with God because of what Jesus did for us. So we can boast then or rejoice, as the ESV says, in the hope of the glory of God. So having been reconciled to God and no longer under his wrath, we have this reason to boast or exalt or rejoice. We're going to talk about what that word means in a minute. And Paul gives us three things that we rejoice in or boast in. The first is in five two, we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. The second is in five three, we rejoice in our sufferings or tribulations, and then he gives a big discussion of that. And then he concludes in 11, we exalt in God, specifically in being reconciled to God. All three of them use the same word. The ESV translates it rejoice. The New American Standard says exalt. I think the King James has glory, the NIV rejoice. All of them translated a little differently. None of them use the word boast, but the same Greek word almost everywhere else it appears in the New Testament is translated boast. And I think that does capture the basic idea, but it's very different than our English word. So let me define what I think this word means and why it's so hard to translate in English. This word, I'll just say boasting, includes the emotional excitement that caused the joy or caused the basis for the boast. So it means to feel that rush of excitement which comes from realizing you are worthy, you have something of value. Now, let me give you an example. Most of us adults are too cool to show this now, but you can see it in kids. When my daughter was in high school, her soccer team was ranked third in the state for her age group, and one year we were competing in the State Cup against a really good team, and the game was very evenly matched. No team seemed to be able to break through to an advantage, and the game ended in a tie. We went into a golden goal overtime, which means the next goal wins. Well, about five minutes in, one of our forwards uh named Kelly got the ball on a fast break, and she was a great player, but she had been going through this scoreless streak where she she just couldn't seem to score no matter how hard she tried, and it had been this long drought of hitting the crossbar, hitting the goalpost, and never finding the back of the net. But this time she put the ball in the net. And you should have seen her body language. That leaping, excitement, bouncing, yell, leap in the air, embrace all your teammates. That feeling is the word boast. That's what this word is trying to capture. She did a great job. She knew she'd done a great job, and she loved it. She was excited about it. So that feeling is what this word tries to capture, which is why a lot of translators use the word rejoice or exalt. It's pointing to that emotional thrill and rush and excitement that where it's just good. You kind of have to pick either the emotional rest or the fact of being worthy, and most translators tend to go for the emotional side. Now, you have to realize boasting in this context, this Greek word, is based on a fully justified, reasonable, accurate fact. It's not an exaggeration. In English, we use the word boast, and it has the connotation that I'm exaggerating. I think I'm great, but I'm not really great. I think I have a reason to be excited or to boast, but really I'm fooling myself, I'm not that good. Well, the Greek word does not have that negative connotation. It's real, it's reasonable, it's accurate. We feel significant because we are significant. We rejoice because we have done something truly good or worthy. It's a fully justified and accurate boast. So, like my saga example, Kelly had reason to rejoice. She had come through in the moment we needed her to come through. Another difference between our English word and this word is that we normally use boast to refer to our own accomplishments, something we've done. If the thing we're rejoicing over or boasting in or exalting over is beyond our control, we tend to use words like lucky or fortunate, but that's not the case with this Greek word. The thing we're boasting about is not something we did, we didn't have a hand in it, we didn't accomplish it at all, but we have reason to boast. To continue my soccer analogy, you should have seen the parents when Kelly scored. We were out of the chairs, arms in the air, yelling, screaming, high five each other, like we had done something glorious, but what had we done? We hadn't done anything. We were just sitting on the side of the field in our folding lawn chairs, drinking cokes and you know biting our knuckles. We fans didn't do anything. We weren't on the field. But from our reaction, you would think we kicked the ball in the net ourselves. Well that's the kind of rejoicing going on here. We share in the joy, but we really didn't have anything to do with it. It's accurate, it's justified, we have good reason to to rejoice, but it's not because of anything we've done. And that's the boast of a believer which comes from justification. It's not based on our accomplishments. That's what Paul argued in the first four chapters of Romans. We are not justified by keeping the law, we are not justified by being born into the right pedigree, there's nothing we have done to be justified, it's a gift. And that's not in conflict with the meaning of this Greek word that I'm calling boast. So what do we legitimately have to boast about, to rejoice over, or find fulfillment in? Paul gives three things, and the first one is in 5.2, we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. So let's define hope and then let's define the glory of God. Hope, the way the New Testament uses it, is a confident, eager expectation that something will happen. R. C. Sproull defines it as faith looking forward. Now we tend to use the word hope in English to express a desire or a wish. Like I might say, I hope it snows today, and that may be a totally unrealistic expectation. It's something I wish would happen, but I really have no idea whether it's going to happen or not, and maybe it's totally unrealistic. The Greek word does not ever express a desire or a wish in that sense. It expresses something I expect to happen. I expect and I'm confident that it will happen. So this word is reserved for something you're convinced of. It's very similar to our word for faith, but it unlike faith, it points to the eagerness with which you look forward to the thing. So for example, when my kids were little, if I told them we were going to Disneyland, they would hope we were going to Disneyland. They would eagerly look forward to going to Disneyland. But if I told them we were having broccoli for dinner, they might have faith that we were having broccoli for dinner. They expected it, but they don't look forward to it with the same joy and anticipation. So we hope, we have a confident, eager expectation, and what is the thing we're hoping in or for? The glory of God. The quality of God's character that attracts or demands respect and admiration. So let's talk about what does he mean by the glory of God and why are we hoping for it? Well, if something is glorious, it has that quality that attracts and demands our attention. It demands appreciation, it demands respect. There's some moral imperative about it that says, look at me, this is too good to miss. For instance, if you're driving down a highway or you're sitting on a mountaintop and you see this glorious sunset, it just demands and captures your attention. Now, something can be glorious for a lot of reasons. Something can be glorious because it's majestic, it's beautiful, it's perfect, it's pure, it's valuable, it's rare. There are a lot of reasons something could be glorious, but whatever that reason, it has some quality that demands we appreciate it. God's glory is multifaceted. He has glory for many, many reasons. He's powerful, he's wise, he's merciful, he's just, he's pure, he's faithful, he's true, he's compassionate, he's full of loving kindness. His glory is unique. And once we understand his glory, it demands respect, it demands awe and appreciation. What Paul's saying here is we have a confident, eager expectation that we will share in one aspect of God's glory, holiness. That's the basis of our worth and our boasting. So we have this confident, eager expectation that one day I will be glorious in one of the ways God is glorious. His glory will be imparted to me. Now, not the full scope, we wanna aren't ever going to be transcendent or anything like that. But one way we will be like God is that we will be holy like He is holy. And we talked about that a couple weeks ago. We will share that integrity, that moral perfection, that pure, impeccable moral character that is no longer flawed or marked by death. It will be a we will have a character, a integrity that is marked by life. God intended us to be creatures that reflect his holiness, that reflect his moral goodness, but we fall short of that. Because of our sin and rebellion, we no longer reflect his glory, but we were created to, and one day we will have that glory again. We have a confident, eager expectation that we will be glorious in that way. That sounds like something that we just say as a theological vocabulary or Christian trite phrases, but think how wonderful that would be. I mean, life would be great if we didn't have this problem with sin and death and tragedy. And the fact of the matter is I wreck my own life with my own selfishness and thoughtlessness and laziness and arrogance. Yes, some of my problems are due to the problems of others or thoughtlessness of others, but really, if I'm honest, most of it's my fault. And the older I get, the more I see this trail of broken relationships and lost opportunities behind me. You know, things that just didn't work out the way I planned, problems I couldn't resolve, friends I let down, or friends I didn't have time for, people I disagreed with and it broke our relationship, and on and on and on. If I could just get over all that mess, life would be great. And that's the promise of the gospel. I find in the gospel that one day I will get over all that mess. I will no longer be that kind of person that leaves a train wreck behind me. Instead, I will be the kind of person that leaves a trail of goodness and fullness and peace and well-being. Now that is a reason to rejoice. Because of this gift of justification made possible by Jesus Christ, we now have this confident, eager expectation that one day we will be holy as God designed us to be holy. So we have a reason to rejoice. We have a reason to boast because we've been singled out by God to be made glorious. We've been singled out by God to be made the type of people who will spread life as we defined it instead of death. We will be full of life and goodness, spreading love and comfort and nurture and healing and leaving people better for our relationship with them. That's our destiny. We have a confident, eager expectation that it will happen. We are becoming holy now, but we're not there yet. We get little tastes and glimpses of it, but one day we will have the full installment. Now that raises a question. The only way I can boast in the hope of the glory of God is if I know that I am in fact a believer. That is, I do in fact have saving faith and am in fact justified. If I know for sure that my faith is real and that I am a believer, then I can really rejoice that I know that I am a child of God and I will be holy one day as God is holy. So on the one hand, the believer's hope is the basis for our worth, but on the other hand, how do I know for sure that I'm a believer? Well, I think that's essentially what Paul goes on to talk about. Let's look at five, three, and four. More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance proven character and character produces hope. So he says, not only that, or more than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, and by sufferings he means just tribulations or any circumstance, hardship, any crisis, any event that puts pressure on my faith. Anything that I have to look at this circumstance and say, Am I gonna trust what God says or am I gonna trust what the world says? Am I gonna do it my way or am I gonna follow what God's word says I should do? Anything that puts that kind of pressure on us. And he says, that kind of suffering produces endurance or perseverance. So having faced a tribulation and gotten out the other side, I think this is what the reformers meant by the perseverance of the saints. It's having the reality of my faith tested and it endures. The fact that my faith is of such quality that when it's tested in a crisis, it is shown to be the real deal. And that's what he goes on to say next. Perseverance produces character. Now I would translate that proven character. It is the characteristic of having been tested and found through the test to be worthy. If it it has been tested, like you test to see if something is really gold, or you test to see if something is really a genuine diamond or not, and you test it, and the test says, yes, this is the real deal. This is the thing, the genuine article. That's what he's talking about here. I go through a trial, the trial puts pressure on my faith, I endure successfully the trial, I come out the other end with my faith and tax, and that proves that I have real, genuine saving faith. So that proves the character of my faith. It is now something that has been tested and shown through the test to be worthy, authentic, real, or genuine. And notice what's being tested here is my faith, not my obedience necessarily, but my faith. Because that's the question. The believer has a hope of the glory of God, but how do I know I'm a believer? Well, we've seen that justification is granted to those who have saving faith. How do I know I have saving faith? That's the critical personal question. Question we all have to have to face at some point. And Paul's saying, well, one way you know it you are a believer, if your faith has been tested and survived the test, if your faith has been shown to be the real, genuine article, then you have objective, tangible evidence that your faith is genuine, and if your faith is genuine, you are a believer, and this hope is yours. When I persevere through tribulations with my faith intact, then I know I have genuine faith. Suffering or trials prove the character of my faith, and when my faith is proven and shown to be the real deal, that gives me hope. I personally can say, I have hope of the glory of God because I went through that thing, whatever it was, that trial, that event, that circumstance, and I am still here trusting God. Then he goes on to say, My hope is certain because God loves us. The hope, the thing I'm hoping for, will inevitably come to pass. It will not fail me because God loves me. Let's look at that in five through ten. And hope does not put us to shame because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die. But God shows his love for us and that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us. Since therefore we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his son, much more now that we are reconciled shall we be saved by his life. Basically, he's arguing that hope will not disappoint because my entering into holiness, my receiving this gift of holiness is not up to me. It is something God imparts to me. So he's not God is not looking at my moral character and expecting me to prove it or improve it or show I'm good enough to be made holy. He's going to impart me holiness through the Holy Spirit, and he loves me enough to make sure that happens. So this is the argument he's he's making. He's saying God loves us enough to make sure we make it. If he loved us enough to justify us while we were under his wrath, then now that we're adopted into his family, don't you think he loves us enough to get us the rest of the way there? So his argument is basically if it takes X amount of love to love your enemy, whom you hate, if it takes whatever amount, X amount of love to do a kindness, to do this huge favor for someone you hate, then surely it takes a smaller amount of love to do a kindness for a friend. And God has already demonstrated the greater amount of love because he did us this kindness of sending his son to die for us right at the time we were helpless, right at the time we were his enemies unable to help ourselves, he stepped into history and made a way for us to be reconciled. So we've seen the cross. We haven't yet seen our glorification, but we have seen the cross, and we know that God loves us enough to get us there. So his basic argument is your hope of the glory of God, your getting through to the end and receiving these promises is guaranteed because God loves you. Not because you have to earn it, not because you have to cooperate in your sanctification, not because you have to respond the right way and get your act together and clean yourself up. You don't even have to do it out of gratitude because he's done the hard part, now you have to do the rest. That is not what he's saying. He's saying you are gonna get there because God loves you enough to get you there. And you know he loves you enough to get you there because he did this amazing, wonderful, compassionate thing right at the point when you were his enemy. And if he loved you enough to die for you while you mocked him and were hating him, now that you're reconciled, now that you have peace with him, now that he's adopted you into his family, don't you think he loves you enough to get you the rest of the way? And that's how he concludes in 511. More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. I think he's making the same point another way around. Reconciliation is important because without it we have no promise. We rejoice in the fact that we are now reconciled to God, that we are now part of his family, that we now stand to inherit his promises, because if we are reconciled to him, if we are no longer under his wrath, then the hope of the gospel, the hope of the glory of God, is in fact ours. So justification made reconciliation possible. It removed the judicial penalty for our sins, making it a way for God to forgive us, and now we can be reconciled to him, we have peace as opposed to war, and he can once again impart life to us. So the so what of being justified is now we have this reason to boast, to rejoice, exalt, because we are gonna be people one day who are marked by life and holiness. And we have a confident, eager, guaranteed expectation that that longing, that deepest desire of our heart to be righteous will one day be satisfied. God has promised, he is faithful to granted, and he has shown us that he was willing to love us even when we were his enemies, so that now that we are adopted into his family, of course he loves us to get us the rest away of the way there. That's our hope. Thank you for listening to Wednesday in the Word. This is the podcast that not only explains what a passage means, but seeks to show you how to figure that out. If you've been touched by this podcast, I'd love to hear about it. You can send me both positive and negative feedback at wednesdayintheword.com. Just email me feedback at wednesdayintheword.com. And while you're there, please take a moment to subscribe to the podcast. You'll find it on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn, or just about anywhere you get your favorite podcasts. Our theme music is graciously provided by Reggie Coates of Heartfeltmusic.org. I encourage you to go to his website and check out his other great music. I'm Krisan Marotta, and you can hear more or listen to previous episodes on wednesdayintheword.com.