D. Scott Meadows

Synopsis of a sermon*

An extremely important passage for understanding the gospel of Jesus Christ is found in Romans 5.10, 11, which says,

10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. 11 And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement.


Its main point could be summarized this way: God has made Christian believers His friends and we rejoice in Him. Six points derived from it help us grasp its message.

1. Formerly, we were enemies to God and counted enemies by Him

The text says that we, Christian believers, were enemies, and are now reconciled to God. Our former status was “enemies to God.” And that hostility was mutual. God was our enemy before He reconciled us to Himself. Many Scriptures prove that God hates sinners and that His wrath abides on them before their conversion. Consider these verses with reverential trembling: Deuteronomy 7.9, 10; 32.41; Psalm 5.4–6; 7.11–13; John 3.36; Ephesians 5.6; 2 Thessalonians 1.6–9; and Revelation 6.15–17; 14.9–11. The Puritan Joseph Alleine wrote,

Sinner, I think this should go like a dagger to your heart, to know that God is your enemy. Oh where will you go? Where will you shelter yourself? There is no hope for you, unless you lay down your weapons and sue out your pardon, and get Christ to stand as your friend and make your peace. If it were not for this, you might go into some howling wilderness, and there pine in sorrow, and run mad for anguish of heart and horrible despair. But in Christ there is a possibility of mercy for you, yea, an offer of mercy to you, that you may have God more for you than He is now against you. But if you will not forsake your sins, nor turn thoroughly and purposefully to God by a sound conversion, the wrath of God abides on you, and He proclaims Himself to be against you, as in the prophet: “Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, Behold I, even I, am against thee!” (Ezek 5.8). [An Alarm to the Unconverted, 1672]


2. We Christian believers have been and are now reconciled to God

Paul’s statement here could be properly translated, “while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God.” Reconciliation occurred for us whose identity at the time of the reconciliation was “enemies;” therefore, this reconciliation is all of grace, an act of the One who reconciled us to Himself. We did not have a change of heart first that softened God toward us. His gracious love acted first to reconcile us to Himself, and then in grace, He softened our hearts toward Him. “We love Him because He first loved us” (1 John 4.19). This status of reconciliation with God never changes for those who have it. Christian believers are now and forever friends of God and of Christ.

3. The death of Christ secured our reconciliation with God
The text says that it was “by [or, through] the death of His [God’s] Son,” the Lord Jesus Christ, that we believers were reconciled to God. The instrumental cause of our reconciliation with God was Christ’s atoning sacrifice for our sins. As Paul announced earlier in this epistle, we are “justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood” (Rom 3.24, 25). Christ’s suffering and death upon the cross offered to God was a propitiation, a sacrifice that appeased His righteous wrath against us, the particular sinners for whom Christ died to save.

The propitiatory and substitutionary nature of Christ’s death has been under attack for centuries by unbelieving biblical scholarship, but it endures to this day because the testimony of Holy Scripture is plain to all who are not sinfully prejudiced against it. It was the death of Christ that secured our reconciliation with God, and that, because Christ endured in our place the wrath that we rightly deserved.

4. The life of Christ will deliver us from God’s future wrath

Paul further announces, “We shall be saved by His [Christ’s] life,” that is, His resurrection life. Paul proceeds from Christ’s atoning death for our reconciliation to His resurrection life and our deliverance from future wrath. That wrath is reserved for the finally impenitent on Judgment Day, but “God has not appointed us [believers] to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ” on that Day (1 Thess 5.9). Our salvation as Christians will only be fully revealed on the Last Day, and it will be more glorious than anything we can imagine.

5. We have received this reconciliation by Christ through faith

Our text says, “we have now received the atonement,” which means that what Christ secured for us on the cross is our actual experience in this life, that is, reconciliation with God. The Greek word translated “atonement” or “reconciliation” (NKJV) is the same root word translated as “reconciled” twice in verse ten. Both the objective side and subjective side of reconciliation are in view, and “atonement” (etymologically, at-ONE-ment, a reconciliation of parties so that they are “at one” with each other; and theologically, propitiation) wonderfully captures both.

Christ the Savior is the one “by whom we have now received” this atonement/reconciliation, which is to say that in receiving Christ by faith, we also receive the actual experience of reconciliation with God (Rom 5.1; 8.1).

6. All this stirs our joyful praise as friends of God

“We also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” The verb “joy” or “rejoice” here means to exult, to boast, to glory. Essentially it refers to Christians jubilantly celebrating all this. Such joyful boasting in God’s grace to us through our Lord Jesus Christ is one important aspect of our worship. We do not glory in ourselves, but in the Lord. He saves us from ruin, and He saves us for full redemption in God’s everlasting kingdom of grace and glory. One free translation puts it this way: “So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God.” This is essentially my original summary statement: “God has made Christian believers His friends and we rejoice in Him.”

Are you trusting in Christ as your Savior? Are you confident of God’s grace toward you in Christ? If so, you can and should praise Him joyfully. You were God’s enemy; now you are His friend, and He is yours. That is good news, my Christian brothers and sisters!

If your heart has become dull in worship, return to a celebratory spirit by hearing, studying, believing, and meditating upon these great gospel truths about Christ’s redeeming work for you, past, present, and future. Consider what future terrors you shall escape by Him. Ponder anew how incomprehensibly blessed you will be in eternal fellowship with Christ and His people.

A living, conscious, deliberate embrace of this gospel stirs us to joyful praise like nothing else can do. Now let Him who is worthy receive our praises to His everlasting glory! Amen.

—
* A recording of this sermon in two parts appears online at the SermonAudio website. More complete notes are available by request to dscottmeadows@gmail.com.