Christ Died for Us

Last week we learned from Romans 3:23-24 that you can be made right before God, but not on your own terms or by your own power. There is nothing you can do to make yourself righteous before God. It is all of God and nothing of you. That is where the next verse along the "Roman's Road" picks up the argument and expands on the truth.

Romans 5:8 says, "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." This truth is at the heart of the gospel message. We can't earn our way to heaven. There is nothing we can do that would get us past "the Pearly Gates," so to speak, and gain us entrance into heaven. Salvation is all of God and none of us.

God didn't send His Son to dangle salvation in front of us that we might grasp for it and fall short. He sent His Son to save us. John 3:16 says, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life." In the original Greek, to "have" means to "hold" or "possess." Eternal life, and all that it includes, is something believers possess. It is secure in Christ.

To fully understand this truth we need to look at the verses leading up to Romans 5:8, the immediate context in which this truth stands. Verse 6 says, "For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly." "In due time" (v. 6b), or "at just the right time" (NIV), "when we were still powerless" (v. 6a, NIV), "Christ died" for us (v. 6b). We were "ungodly" (v. 6b) and unable to help ourselves. We had no hope of salvation. We couldn't save ourselves, so God took care of it for us "at just the right time" (v. 6b). This was the greatest manifestation of God's love in all of history.

God's great love is demonstrated in the fact that Christ died for "the ungodly" (v. 6b). By contrast Paul notes in verse 7, "For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die." The point is this: rarely would a person sacrifice his own life to save the life even of someone seen to be of upright character, though Paul concedes that on a rare occasion perhaps someone would "dare to die" for one thought to be "good" (v. 7b). It is even less likely that anyone would sacrifice himself to save someone who is known to be evil. Yet that is just what God did. He died for the "ungodly" (v. 6b), and in that we find our security.

That brings us back to the heart of the matter in Romans 5:8—"But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." This is the main point. It was for "sinners" that "Christ died" (v. 8b). He died for people who were neither "righteous" (v. 7a) nor "good" (v. 7b). He died for the "ungodly" (v. 6b)—for "sinners" (v. 8b). He died for you and me when we were helpless sinners. God loves you; Christ died for you. That is the bottom line.

"For" (v. 8b) means "on behalf of." Christ died on your behalf. God's love, poured out at the cross of Christ, shows again that you are eternally bound to the Savior when you trust in Him. Amen.