Knowing That Proven Character Produces Hope
1Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; 2through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3Not only this, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance; 4and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope: 5and hope doesn’t disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. 6For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a righteous person someone would even dare to die. 8But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 9Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we will be saved from God’s wrath through him. 10For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we will be saved by his life. 11Not only so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.
Abraham, too, was in the end a weak man, and at times he wavered, yet by faith he was justified before God. Abraham and all God’s people are justified by faith in Jesus Christ, who atoned for their sins. Had Jesus not borne the cross, we could not have had faith, could not be justified, and could not have peace with God. But now our standing has changed, so we can live a life that rejoices in hope of the glory of God, and we can be at peace in him. To enjoy this rest, personal faith is absolutely necessary.
Romans 5:1-2
1Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; 2through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God.
A believer who has heard the gospel and grown mature in faith ought to know the sacrifice of Christ and the pain of God, and, with a heart thankful to the God who gives eternal hope and grace, should resolve to live a good life. Whoever believes in Christ’s resurrection can endure in times of suffering, without fixing their eyes on this dark world. Those who endure in faith will never betray God for the world’s sake. No one, of course, is glad to suffer. Still, God leads us to the light in a world as dark as night, and the Holy Spirit gives us eternal hope, so that those who have been declared righteous will not live lives of shame. Think of a diamond buried deep in the earth. It cannot shine on its own, so no one pays it any attention. But once a miner brings it into the world, a skilled cutter shapes it at precise angles so that it gives off as much light as possible, and an appraiser grades it and sets its price. If it receives a high grade, the diamond learns what a precious jewel it is, and what beautiful light lay hidden in it in the darkness. From then on its task is to give off a lovely, brilliant light, so that it becomes its owner’s pride. True, before a diamond can shine like this, it must endure the pain of having the rock clinging to it ground away; but when its cut facets catch the light and sparkle, the beauty is beyond words.
When we who were in darkness receive God’s call and by faith become people with a heavenly hope, we naturally reflect the light of God’s glory. We were living without knowing how beautiful a light we could give off, but through grace we have been born again as new people who shine from within. Enduring hardship is so hard that sometimes we weep and sometimes we laugh, but through such times we grow a little more like Christ. We cannot shine by ourselves, yet through the light of Christ’s glory we have been born again as God’s precious people. When God’s people gave off the light of Christ, God declared them righteous and told them that, since they had received Jesus Christ, they were free to enjoy peace with him. Jesus Christ is the one who brings us sinners into a relationship of peace with the righteous God; those who have received Christ may therefore enjoy peace and rest to the full. This is the heart of today’s passage.
Having forgiven our sins, God pours out his grace on us without ceasing. If we believe that he has made us live within the grace of Christ, and we exalt and praise his name, God himself will receive the glory. This is the grace of God, who called children of darkness to be children of light, and the blessing of salvation we receive through faith in Christ. Just as no one throws a diamond back into the ground, the children who call on God’s name will never be cast away.
Romans 5:3-5
3Not only this, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance; 4and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope: 5and hope doesn’t disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
The word for “suffering” here, thlipsesin, is the feminine noun formed from the Greek verb thlibō. Thlibō means to squeeze out blood, sweat, tears, and pain, the way juice is pressed out of grapes in a winepress. Put simply, it means “to undergo a trial one cannot bear.” And the word “rejoice” carries the sense of “to leap for joy,” “to exult,” or “to boast.” Anyone who was pressed like grapes, made to pour out blood, sweat, tears, and pain, and leapt for joy because the pain delighted them, would hardly be normal. Yet the apostle Paul is saying that those who know grace know it far outweighs the persecution and suffering they endure for the gospel. People who have a deep hope through faith give more weight to God’s grace than to the world’s suffering, and that is why they can rejoice.
The world hates Christ, so when Christians hold their lamps high and preach the gospel, persecution is bound to follow. They cannot escape suffering at the hands of those who persecute them to keep the dark world from being lit, and it is certainly a pain hard to bear. Such hardship hurts, but suffering endured to stay faithful will make a believer’s faith complete. The love of Christ and the eternal Kingdom of God, discovered in the midst of suffering, will bring joy, and they turn present hardship into gladness of soul.
Someone lost in the mountains who spots a small light would be ready to leap for joy. A light they never noticed while living in brightness becomes a great joy and hope in a darkness where they cannot see a step ahead. People who do not know the eternal Kingdom of God and the love of Christ cannot begin to understand Christians who rejoice in a heavenly hope. But those who have learned perseverance through suffering and hold on to hope have the strength to withstand the world’s persecution, so as to be among those who remain to the end. In those days, anyone who preached the gospel suffered severe persecution and had to be ready to die, so when Paul told the church to rejoice in suffering, he was speaking of what they commonly went through. All who heard his words, then, could take heart.
James 1:2-3
2Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations, 3knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.
The Christians of that day actually rejoiced in the persecution they suffered for Christ. Filled with the Holy Spirit, they did not yield to persecution and mockery, and they prayed without ceasing for the strength to stand against their opponents. As a result, just as Jesus Christ commended God’s love by dying on the cross, those in the midst of suffering commended that same love through their hardships. Their suffering naturally displayed their perseverance, and through their faith they bore the fruit of salvation.
Suffering is like the pressure applied to carbon to make a diamond: as we persevere to hold fast to our faith, the character of God is formed within us. Suffering, perseverance, and hope, by which we are sanctified, can greatly display God’s glory, so we must live them out by faith. It is the Holy Spirit who encourages us when we suffer. It is the Spirit who gives hope, and the Spirit who fills us with God’s love so that we do not lose heart. That the Holy Spirit is with us also shows that God will never forsake his people. After Jesus’ death and resurrection, God would not have needed to do anything more; yet as a sign that his overflowing love and grace are being poured out on us without ceasing, he caused the Holy Spirit to walk with us. If those who have received such wonderful love do not take grace for granted, they will receive the blessing that leads to eternal life.
Romans 5:6
6For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.
The apostle Paul sets out clearly God’s time and our time. He says that while we were yet weak, God sent his Son Jesus, as he had promised, to die.
Galatians 4:4-5
4But when the fullness of the time came, God sent out his Son, born to a woman, born under the law, 5that he might redeem those who were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of children.
As this passage says, God sent his Son at the time he had appointed and redeemed all sinners under the law from their sins. Because no one could keep the whole law, people had no hope of coming to God and could find no way of salvation. So God, as he had promised, caused them to be atoned for by his Son’s blood, and made those who were shown grace receive the adoption of children. We were not saved by human devotion or effort; we were saved because God, as the Lord of history, fulfilled everything he had promised. Jesus bore the cross to lift the burden of death from the ungodly who do not know God—that is, from sinners who could not escape death. His sacrifice opened the way for the ungodly to come to God and became life for those sunk in death. No one would step forward to die in the place of an enemy they could never forgive. Yet Jesus went to the cross to save sinners who could not escape the total depravity and original sin that began with the transgression of Adam and Eve. The apostle Paul expresses the purpose of Jesus Christ’s atonement in many ways.
Galatians 1:4
4who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us out of this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father—
Ephesians 5:2
2Walk in love, even as Christ also loved you, and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling fragrance.
Titus 2:14
14who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify for himself a people for his own possession, zealous for good works.
Stressing that Christ sacrificed himself for us while we were still sinners, the apostle Paul labors to teach the great love of God, a love people could not grasp.
John 15:1-3
1“I am the true vine, and my Father is the farmer. 2Every branch in me that doesn’t bear fruit, he takes away. Every branch that bears fruit, he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. 3You are already pruned clean because of the word which I have spoken to you.
What I have passed on to you from the apostle Paul so far, Jesus explained concisely with an illustration. Jesus, the vine, knew that what God the farmer wanted was fruit, so he endured with all his strength the pain of driving his roots deep into the ground, because the deeper the roots go, the more fruit the farmer can gather. When at last the branches hung heavy with clusters of fruit, the farmer and the vine became one and could share their joy. This is the picture of how God and his people, who became the fruit of salvation through Jesus’ sacrifice of himself, came to be reconciled. The fierce winds of the world can be a severe trial to a branch bearing fruit, but if the branch does not break, it will bear far more fruit each year. We could be saved because all of this was there: God, who became our hedge; Jesus Christ, who sacrificed himself to send the roots deep; and the Holy Spirit, who kept constant watch so that the world’s pests would not make the fruit drop.
There were people who believed in Jesus Christ and remained faithful: the Puritans. Let us look briefly at these Puritans, who gave their lives for their faith. Because they knew God’s love and had been reconciled to him, they could guard their faith with their very lives. The world rejected them for their faith, but they believed that God would lead them, and they held firm to the end as his people. Through cruel suffering the Puritans never betrayed God. Their pain must have been all the greater, because it is hard to persevere while watching brothers in the faith die of disease and fall to enemy attacks. Yet a heavenly hope held them, and with it they could endure. Anyone who suffers wonders why God is putting them through such trials; but when, having persevered, they came to celebrate Thanksgiving, they realized that the trials they had been through were God’s plan to lead them to America. They saw with their own eyes God’s plan to save others through their faith, their perseverance, and their evangelism. They realized that all they had been put through until then had been a course of training to make them shine like a diamond. Had they followed the Lord in comfort in England, they would never have known how fiercely the world rejects Christ, and they would have had no chance to come to America, meet the Native Americans, and share the gospel with them. Without hardship there would have been no chance to be born again, and while saying they believed in Jesus Christ, they would have lived just like the people of the world.
If we look at the world’s suffering with the mind of the flesh, we can never persevere, never be born again, and never understand God’s plan as he trims and shapes us. But if we look at suffering from the place of gratitude, as those called to be God’s children, we can face the problem with a higher hope, which is what makes perseverance possible. The Puritans witnessed death every day, but because their perseverance was not forced, their hearts overflowed with deep joy and gladness. That they shared the gospel with Native Americans who knew nothing of God shows that they lived good lives for the sake of the gospel. Because they persevered in faith, they could bring the gospel to them and, going further, worship together with them at a Thanksgiving service. Showing faith by one’s life in a harsh world is never easy, but the Puritans put the word into practice and embraced in love those who did not know Christ. God, who knew their human suffering, answered their earnest prayers and worked so that more souls might be saved. Their perseverance and prayer bore the fruit of saved souls.
Psalms 119:92-93
92Unless your law had been my delight, I would have perished in my affliction. 93I will never forget your precepts, for with them, you have revived me.
Those who have been reconciled to God can persevere, because, though life in the world is hard and painful, they know how joyful and glad it is to live in God. David, hunted by King Saul, confessed that he was so afraid in circumstances where death seemed certain that he wished he could simply perish. Yet, he said, because he knew God’s grace he could endure, and because he had grasped the law of love he could live by faith.
If we too set firmly in place the love of Jesus Christ, who became our atoning sacrifice, we can have eternal hope even in suffering the world cannot bear, and we can live joyfully, preaching the gospel. Because such joy and gladness are a gift only the Holy Spirit can give, may you always live with a thankful heart. Many things will come your way as you live, but if you set the love of Christ firmly at the center of your life, you will bear fruit to offer to God.
How much fruit of salvation have you borne? Do you have fruit you can bring to God to show that you too labored for the saving of souls? To serve faithfully in your place as one of God’s people is to share in Christ’s sacrifice. Even if we cannot bear the cross as Jesus did, even if we cannot be martyred as Paul was, if we stand firm in the faith to carry the small cross entrusted to each of us, the Holy Spirit will help us bear fruit. The love of Christ gave us life, and the grace of the Holy Spirit helped us overcome suffering. I hope you will persevere in hope even in hardship, become people who love the Lord’s law, and take up your calling so that more souls may enter the Kingdom of God.