Our Powerful Savior

Romans 5:18-21

18 Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. 19 For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.

 20 The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, 21 so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

            I am completely overwhelmed as I reflect on the gospel this morning. This is one of the few times of the year where the gospel is everywhere. People are updating their statuses and tweeting about it. As I read the countless posts my heart was filled with awe and wonder at the truth of the gospel. It is glorious to see the gospel being proclaimed and discussed by people everywhere. It is beautiful to see God’s people making much of Jesus Christ! Where would we be without Him? There would be no Good Friday, there would be no Easter, and there would be no hope without Jesus Christ! I want to take a few minutes this morning to reflect on Jesus’ power as clearly seen in the gospel!

            In Romans 5 Paul boldly and beautifully lays Jesus’ power. He starts by reminding us of the direness of our situation. God made Adam in His own image. In love God brought forth mankind. God created us to be with Him. We were the crowning jewel of all He created. He told Adam that he would be the keeper of all God had created on the earth (Gen. 1:28). God told Adam that he could have anything, but He told him to stay away from the “tree in the middle of the garden.” (Gen. 3:1). That fruit represented something terrible. Satan had already rebelled against God. He had already tried to overthrow Him. It seems that God knew that Satan would want those “made in His image” to join his rebellion against God. God told Adam to stay away from the tree, because the consequences would be unimaginable. However, Adam wanted to exchange life WITH God for the opportunity to BE God (Gen. 3:5). In a single instance everything changed. Adam joined the rebellion.  We were doomed…

            Paul tells us that “sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and this way death came to all men, because all sinned.” (Rom. 5:12).  From Adam came an entire race of doomed people. Psalm 51 tells us that even from the womb we are broken. No amount of good works could ever possibly cure the curse that we have. Adam had failed. Every single person that had ever lived perpetuated that failure. Could there be a more hopeless situation? It would absolutely be hopeless if not for God Himself. The God who determined before He ever laid the foundations of the earth that He would send His Son to do what we could never, ever do (Eph. 1:4-5). 

            As I read Romans 5 this morning I was overcome with emotions. Through Adam we were all cursed. There is absolutely nothing we could do to change the fact that we were dead men walking. No amount of good deeds or selflessness or anything could ever change the truth. We are cursed to die. The curse of the garden was death! We are all decaying physically but we are stillborn at birth spiritually. How can dead men live again? We only had one hope. We needed a Savior to do what we could never do.

            Romans 5:19 tells us “through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.” Jesus Christ was our only hope… period. Jesus knew that we were dead. He knew that we were helpless to save ourselves. He did the unimaginable. He said I will do what you could never do. I will live the perfect life you could never live. I will give you the perfection you would never know without me. I will take all your wickedness and your sin and I will face the wrath of my Father. I will let men break my body. I will spill my blood for you. I will do what it takes to bring dead men back to life! I will take your punishment so that you will never, ever taste death. I will fix what you could never fix. I will face Hell itself to bring you back to my Father. I have come to set you free and whom I set free is “free indeed.” And He would do it all because He loves us! He saw the unlovable mess that was mankind, and He came and He rescued and He loved. He still loves.  His gospel was much more than making bad men good; His gospel was about brining dead men back to life!

He was powerful both in the life He lived and the death He died. He lived the life we could never live. He was tempted like we are; yet He never sinned. In Matthew 4 Jesus is lead by the Holy Spirit into the desert. It was really the Garden of Eden all over again. However, this time there are no trees, there is no tree of knowledge, but there is still that same serpent that wooed Adam to rebel against God. That serpent wanted so badly for the “second Adam” to meet the fate of the first. However, in power the Savior of men faced the serpent. Unlike Adam, Jesus did not fall to the serpent’s song. He did what no man could ever do. He knew that He was God’s Son and He knew that He had been sent to make death’s slaves into God’s sons. The Son of God came to transform hopeless slaves into sons of the living God! Jesus sent the serpent away in defeat so that He could defeat the curse! He lived an unstained life we could never live. In power Jesus Christ lived and in power Jesus Christ died.

Jesus went to the cross on behalf of mankind. He exchanged His perfect life for all of our sin. He literally loved us to death. It was not in weakness that God’s Son died on the cross, but it was in power! He did what no one could ever do. He broke the curse of death. He freed us from the clutches of Hell by taking our punishment on Himself.  He brought dead men back to life!

In power Jesus lived, in power Jesus died, and in power He resurrected from the dead! He now sits at the right hand of God. He came to this earth to do what Adam had failed to do, what we all had failed to do. He came to earth to redeem dead men and to make them sons of God.

Where would we be without Jesus? As I read Romans 5 today I could do nothing but weep. The hope of humanity rested on Jesus shoulders and He proved that He was powerful enough the bear the load we could never bear! He suffered in our place to bring us to the safety of God’s arms. Jesus is powerful and His gospel proves it! Let’s worship Him today! Let’s remember every single day of our lives how His gospel changes everything!