Saved by His sacrifice, secured by His life — Romans 5:6–11

From a sermon · Romans 5:6–11

Romans 1 is the guilt of the pagan world. Romans 2 is the guilt of the moral and religious man — no one is exempt. Romans 3 is universal condemnation and a glorious solution. Romans 4 is Abraham, justified by faith and not works, proving the idea isn't new. Chapter 5 shifts from explanation to application: what justification does for you. Verses 1–2, peace and hope. Verses 3–5, growth through suffering. Verses 6–11, love proved in Christ. Verses 12–19, Adam's legacy and Christ's triumph. Verses 20–21, grace reigns. Here are verses 6 through 11, in five movements.

The pitiful predicament (v. 6)

"For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly."

Three words for who we were. Helpless — "dead in trespasses and sins" (Ephesians 2:1). Hopeless — waiting, without knowing it, for "the time to come to completion" when God would send His Son (Galatians 4:4). And ungodly — the people of Romans 1:28–32, whom God "delivered over," "filled with all unrighteousness." That's the patient on the table. Nothing to offer, no way to help, no reverence for God. And it was for that person that Christ died.

The perfect provision (vv. 7–8)

"For rarely will someone die for a just person — though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us."

You'd struggle to find a volunteer to die for a righteous man. Maybe, just maybe, someone would for a truly good one. But God demonstrated His love by sending His Son to die for us while we were still sinners — not after we cleaned up, not after we earned it, while we were still lost. That's the provision: perfect, complete, and made before we ever asked.

The powerful pardon (v. 9)

"How much more then, since we have now been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath."

God's wrath is real. "He that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him" (John 3:36). The unrepentant are warned: "treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath" (Romans 2:5). "Whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire" (Revelation 20:15). The hymn says it: "Till on that cross as Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied." There are only two places God's wrath will ever be poured out: on Christ, if you are in Him — or on you, if you die without Him. Justified by His blood, we're saved from it.

The permanent preservation (v. 10)

"For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, then how much more, having been reconciled, will we be saved by his life."

If God reconciled us when we were His enemies (2 Corinthians 5:18–19), how much more will He keep us now that we're His children? Christ's death saved us; Christ's life keeps us. "He ever liveth to make intercession for them" (Hebrews 7:25). "I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand" (John 10:28). Saved by His sacrifice. Secured by His life.

The passionate praise (v. 11)

"And not only that, but we also boast in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received this reconciliation."

"Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered" (Psalm 32:1). Jesus is the once-for-all atonement Hebrews 9 and 10 describe. And people who've received it can't keep quiet about it: "we cannot but speak the things which we have seen and heard" (Acts 4:20).

The happiest man anyone ever knew

His name was Louis Zamperini. He ran in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. In the war his bomber went down in the Pacific and he survived forty-seven days on a raft, circled by sharks and strafed by enemy planes, before being captured and spending two years in Japanese prison camps, where a guard nicknamed "the Bird" made it his personal mission to break him. He came home a hero. But he wasn't free. The nightmares came every night. He drank to silence them. His marriage was falling apart. He was planning to go back to Japan and murder the Bird.

By every measure, Louis Zamperini was helpless, hopeless, and ungodly. And it was for that man — bitter, drunk, plotting murder — that Christ had already died.

In October 1949 his wife, Cynthia, dragged him to a canvas tent in Los Angeles where a young preacher named Billy Graham was holding meetings. Louis hated it. The first night, Graham read "all have sinned," and Louis knew it was aimed at him and stormed out. But he came back. On the second night, Graham said, "If you suffer, I'll give you the grace to go forward," and in a flash Louis was back on the raft, dying of thirst, whispering a prayer he'd forgotten: "If You will save me, I will serve You forever." God had saved him. Louis had walked away and never looked back — until that moment.

He walked down the sawdust aisle, got on his knees, and asked God to forgive him. No excuses, no bargaining. He called on the name of the Lord. And he said later, "While I was still on my knees, I forgave all my guards. And I knew I was through smoking, drinking, and chasing women." That night he poured every bottle down the drain, went to bed, and for the first time in five years slept without a nightmare. He never had another one for the rest of his life.

He didn't leave that tent carrying a solemn religious burden. He found Graham the next morning and said he was "bubbling over with joy." Two days later he was on a train to his first speaking engagement. For sixty-five years he gave his life away. He went back to Japan — to the very prisons where he'd been tortured — and preached the gospel, and when he recognized his old guards in the crowd, he jumped off the stage, ran down the aisle, and threw his arms around them. He started a camp for troubled boys. In his seventies he skateboarded around the church parking lot with, as one witness put it, "utter joy and abandon." In his nineties he stood at Dodger Stadium in front of fifty thousand people, still telling the story. A pastor who walked with him for years was asked who the happiest man he'd ever known was, and answered without hesitation: Louie Zamperini. He died at ninety-seven. Still telling it. Still joying in God.

Helpless — a slave to nightmares, rage, and the bottle. Christ died for him while he was undeserving. He received the pardon — instantly, supernaturally, the nightmares silenced in a single night. He was preserved — God had not forgotten the prayer on the raft even when Louis had. And then sixty-five years of passionate, uncontainable praise. Not polite religious contentment. Joy. The kind that makes an old man skateboard. The kind that makes a man embrace his torturer. The kind that gets on a train without knowing where it's going, because the One who saved you is already there. That's what it looks like to have received the atonement.

How to be saved

Admit: "all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). Believe: "if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved" (Romans 10:9). Call: "whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved" (Romans 10:13). You can do that today.

The same pardon

Louis didn't earn one minute of that. Helpless is the word Paul used, and it's the word for every one of us before God ever moves. So here's the whole offer, plain: Christ died for the ungodly, and that's all of us; God raised Him up; and anybody who calls on Him receives it. Not probation. A pardon. You can have it tonight in the same shape he had it — a promise you can't keep, a debt you can't pay, and a Savior who already covered both.

And if you've received the atonement already, when's the last time you told anybody what you got saved out of? Not the tidy version. The nightmares. The bottle. The thing you don't say in a small group. This week, give one person one sentence of your before. One sentence.

Joy is contagious, but only if somebody actually hears it.

Related: Romans 5:1–11 — peace with God and Whoever calls on the name of the Lord.