The Gift Not the Wage, Please; Romans 5-8

May the mumbling commence!

Yesterday, we thought about the wonderful retirement package that God gives us – one that is available NOW for those who will claim in through faith.  But we do NOT earn that retirement package.  Let’s look at the last verse from Romans chapter six from a different translation (NJB):

For the wage paid by sin is death; the gift freely given by God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Verses 22-23)

So, we must ask ourselves: Do I want what I have earned, which is death?  Or do I want what has been freely given through Christ Jesus, which is eternal life?  It seems to me a no-brainer.  I want the gift!

And there is nothing we can do to earn this gift.  Paul illustrates this truth in what I like to call the “do” passage in Romans chapter seven.  Read it below (NJB):

I do not understand my own behavior; I do not act as I mean to, but I do things that I hate.  While I am acting as I do not want to, I still acknowledge the Law as good, so it is not myself acting, but the sin which lives in me.  And really, I know of nothing good living in me – in my natural self, that is – for though the will to do what is good is in me, the power to do it is not: the good thing I want to do, I never do; the evil thing which I do not want – that is what I do.  But every time I do what I do not want to, then it is not myself acting, but the sin that lives in me. 

So I find this rule: that for me, where I want to do nothing but good, evil is close at my side.  In my inmost self I dearly love God's law, but I see that acting on my body there is a different law which battles against the law in my mind. So I am brought to be a prisoner of that law of sin which lives inside my body. 

What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death? 

God – thanks be to him – through Jesus Christ our Lord. So it is that I myself with my mind obey the law of God, but in my disordered nature I obey the law of sin. (Verses 15-25)

Just as Christ told Peter: “The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.”  We have the will to do what is right, but the power to actually do it is not in our bodies.  For this reason, we are prisoners of the law of sin.

Indeed, it is a wretched condition.  And we need to be saved.

Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ.  We are saved through his death and resurrection.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out