ROMANS 5:1-5 JUSTIFIED RESULTS2015 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: Romans 5:1-5 Justified Results

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2015. We are here this evening in Romans chapter 5, and we'll be looking at verses 1 through 5. And so I'd like to start out the evening by reading through our portion together. Verse 1 says, Therefore...

Having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance, and perseverance, character, and character, hope."

Verse 5, now hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

This evening, as we look at Romans chapter 5, verses 1 through 5, we're talking about justified results. For the past couple weeks, we've been looking at this idea of justification by faith. That's what Paul's been talking about in chapter 3 and 4. Now, if I could just back up for a moment, I'm going to talk about justification by faith.

As we went back to Romans chapter 1, Paul began talking about the wrath of God being revealed. And he, starting from chapter 1 all the way to chapter 3 verse 20, made the case that all humanity is guilty and deserving of the wrath of God.

But then in chapter 3 verse 21 and then on into chapter 4, he made the point that we are justified by faith. That word justified, we defined it as being declared not guilty and righteous. Being justified is both things happening at the same time where God declares you not guilty. Even though Paul says,

those three chapters making the point that everybody's guilty when you are justified by faith in Jesus Christ, he declares that you are not guilty. And so that guilt that previously put you in a condition of deserving the wrath of God, now that guilt has been removed. You've been cleared of that guilt by believing in Jesus.

But on top of that, then we also saw that righteousness, the righteousness of Jesus Christ is accounted to you or deposited into your account as well. And so when you believe in Jesus, you are cleared of guilt and then you are accounted righteous. And so in the last part of chapter 3, Paul went on.

into that point of making sure that we understood that you're not guilty, that your freedom was purchased, and that the punishment that you deserved was paid by Jesus Christ. And then in chapter 4, we looked at Abraham as the model of faith, the example of faith, and we saw the righteousness being accounted to Abraham, being deposited into Abraham's account, that it could not be earned in

It could not be deserved, but he was righteous because he believed.

And so he was justified. He was declared not guilty and he was declared righteous. And those who believe in Jesus are justified. You and I as believers in Jesus are justified. You are declared not guilty and you are declared righteous. And so he's been making that case up into this point as we looked at chapter 3 and 4 of Romans.

But now as we go into chapter 5, he begins to make a little bit of application.

And so we'll look at four results of justification. What is it that that means for us that we've been justified? You've been declared not guilty. You've been declared righteous. But what does that mean and how does that impact your life? And so the first result that we see from justification found in verse 1 is that you have peace with God.

Not only is this, you know, the logical truth, as Paul's been building this logical argument, that salvation has always been about being justified by faith. But that means then, and what that impacts your life, is it gives you peace with God. Again, in verse 1, he says, "...therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."

And so he says, therefore, again, because we've been justified by faith, well, now here's the result. We've been justified. Now, I like to point out that the tense here is past tense. He says, having been justified by faith.

As we talk about being justified, you need to know it's a one-time event. And as a believer in Jesus, it's a past event. Because when you believe in Jesus, you are justified. And so this has taken place for you as a believer. You have been justified. And so here's the result. He says, we have peace with God.

This idea of peace is not peace in, sometimes we talk about having a peace about something. You know, it's like we're not troubled by it. We kind of have this nice, you know, tranquil state or condition. But that's not the peace that he's talking about here. He says we have peace with God. This is talking about a reconciliation. Right?

about two who were at odds with one another, two who were opposed to each other. There was enmity between you and God. But now, because you've been justified, you have peace with God. There was a time where you were not at peace with God.

Paul talks about this a little bit in Romans chapter 8 verse 7. He says, And there he's talking about the flesh versus the spirit and how if we're living according to the flesh, we can't be at peace with God because the flesh, the carnal mind, is at enmity against God.

Naturally for us, there is this battle between our minds and between God. It's a constant battle that will be there for us by our nature. But having been justified, that changes. And having been justified, we have peace with God.

we have restored that relationship. That relationship has been reconciled. And so now you don't have enmity between you and God, and God doesn't have enmity towards you. But instead, there is peace. Now, don't think of this like just a ceasing from battle.

Don't think of it like as a pause in the war, as if like the peace could end at any moment. This is a lasting peace. This word for peace, it's based on the verb, which means to bind together that which has been separated.

to bind together. And that's what this piece is. You have been bound together with the Lord. You were separated. There was a separation in your relationship with God because of sin, because of the carnality, because of the flesh. But you have been justified. And so now you and God have been bound together. You are united together.

And there is peace. And you don't have to think of it in like a suspicious way, like any wrong move and that peace is broken. You know, that treaty, you know, has been nullified and now God's at war with you again. Paul's point is, no, you have peace with God. It's been established. You've been bound together.

It's not something that you have to stress out about, like maybe all of a sudden we don't have peace any longer. Or maybe if something happens, then I'm not going to have peace with God any longer. No, you have been justified, and so therefore you have peace with God. In other words, God's on your side. He's with you. He's not against you. You have peace with God.

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my friend who lived right across the street from my house. And I don't know what happened, but I was really stubborn and he was the first to apologize. And I remember that because my dad scolded me afterwards. He said, hey, you're the Christian. You should apologize first. And so I remember him apologizing and I was stubborn. It took me a while, but finally I apologized. And then five minutes later, it was like nothing had ever happened. I mean, we were back just best friends once again. It was

long history, you know, or long, I don't know what, you know, it was long ago. It was like long forgotten. It was like nothing had ever happened. And that's what this is like, this peace with God. It's now that you've been justified, then God relates to you

As if nothing had ever happened. As if you've never sinned. As if you've never wronged him. As if you've never opposed him. You have peace with God. You already have it. This is really important. Because you have already been justified, and remember it's past tense, you already have peace with God. And so peace with God is not something that you have to earn.

It's not something that you have to work for. It's not something that you have to like try to deserve. It's something that you already have by believing in Jesus. And so right now, no matter what's been happening in your life today, you have peace with God.

No matter where you've been at all week, you have peace with God as a believer in Jesus. You have been justified, and so therefore, you have peace with God. It's not a possibility. It's not hit and miss. You know, some Christians have peace with God, and some don't have peace with God. Every believer has peace with God. Now, the battle regarding this peace is,

can often happen in our minds because you may not feel like you have peace. You may not think that you have peace, but that's where we have to come back to what the scriptures say and follow Paul's logic, follow these arguments that he's established. You've been declared not guilty. You've been

accounted completely righteous. And so therefore, there's nothing separating you and God. There is nothing in between you. There is nothing that you have to worry about. God is not out to get you. He's not trying to punish you more. You have peace with God, and He has peace with you. You've been reunited and bound together.

And so the first result we see from justification is that you have peace with God. Secondly, as we continue on in verse 2, we see that the second result is that you have access to grace. In verse 2, he says, "...through whom also," talking about the Lord Jesus, "...we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God."

And so Paul says, not only do you have peace, but also you have access into this grace. You have access to the grace of God. Now we've talked about the grace of God a couple times, and it'll be a continued theme throughout the book of Romans, because Romans is about the gospel, and the gospel is according to grace. The gospel is about the grace of God, and so grace is God's

favor towards us that we do not earn, that we cannot deserve? And how do we find ourselves, or how do we put ourselves in this position where God deals with us with his favor, with

That we cannot earn or deserve. How do we get in that spot where we just get to experience the waterfall of God's grace? Where do you get to be or what do you have to do in order to put yourself in that position? Well, he says we have access into this grace by faith. The way to receive the grace of God is by faith. The way to put yourself in a position where you are continually in God's favor is

is to believe. It's by faith. We have access by faith into this grace. The word access, it means to be granted admission. You're granted admission. So it's like you have your ticket stub and so you can come in.

Or you have your annual pass. And so you can come in. You have access. Now it also pictures that the word is often used when it's speaking of someone being brought into the presence of a king. So, you know, if there's someone that you just can't walk in and see, but you

You make an appointment or maybe you know somebody who can introduce you and so they bring you into their presence and they introduce you and this introduction, this access is granted in that way. And that's the idea here is you've been ushered in by Christ. The introductions have been made. Father, meet Richard. Richard, meet the Father. You have access to the grace of God.

to this position of absolute favor from God that you cannot earn and could never deserve. You have access by faith. It's not something that you work for. It's not something that you try to strive for. You can't, you know, give enough in the offering to earn it or to deserve it. It's by faith that you get to experience God's favor.

Now again, sometimes there's a battle in our minds regarding this. Maybe you don't feel like you're in this position of God's favor just being poured out on you. Because you're like, well, if I'm in that position, then why don't I have this? And why don't I have that? And why do I got these problems? And why do I got this? And we'll get to that in a couple points here. Paul's going to deal with that. But never forget that by faith you have access to grace.

Never forget that God's on your side and he is constantly doing good for you and on your behalf. You are in his favor. You're not out of his favor. Well, I kind of messed up today and I, you know, cursed out that guy on the freeway. So I think I'm out of favor with God. I'm not talking, I didn't do that. I didn't even drive today, but barely at all. I'm not, I'm saying you did that.

So maybe I'm out of favor with God. Maybe I don't, you know. No, you have been justified by believing in Jesus. And so therefore, you have access to grace. You have access to God's favor. And you get to experience the fullness of all that God has for you. The great blessings and abundance of what God has for you by believing in Jesus. You have access to God by faith.

And then he goes on to say, we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand. And so this grace is not just something that happens at the beginning. It's not just grace for salvation, grace for conversion, that you believe in Jesus, you're born again, and then that's the limit of your grace. No, he says it's grace in which we stand. Everything after conversion for the Christian is

is also according to the grace of God. Everything, our whole life depends on and stands upon the grace of God. And you have access to this grace by faith. And so as a believer in Jesus, you are never out of God's favor. Never. You know, sometimes you can get out of somebody's favor, right? That is, well, there was a time where they would always do favors for you.

And then something happened. And now they don't do you favors no more. You got out of their favor, right? It's kind of a crude example, but you get the point. You don't get to do that with God. You're never out of his favor where he decides, you know, kind of offended. I'm not going to do that for you. I know it's good for you, but yeah, you could live without it. God never relates to us like that. He's never moody.

He never gets upset. Yeah, you mess up. I'm not trying to say that we are perfect. No, we still sin. We still fall short. But you have been justified. You have been declared not guilty. And you've been declared righteous. And so God accounts you as fully righteous. So he never relates to you as if you're not righteous. You're never out of his favor. You're always in his favor because you have been justified by faith.

Now, this would be completely different if you were justified by works. If you were justified by works, well then, yeah, you would have to work really hard to make sure that God accounts you as righteous and that you stay in his favor. And then you're going to be wearing yourself out, always trying to earn God's favor and to keep yourself in that spot. But that's not the salvation that God has provided for us. To be justified by

That is to be declared not guilty and to be declared righteous. That happens by faith. And if you've believed in Jesus, that has already happened. You have been justified. And so therefore, you have access to grace. And therefore, you continue to stand in the grace of God. And so you can just stay there. Whether you feel like it or not, you are there as a recipient, just a waterfall of God's grace just pouring out on you.

Now, you may not see all that God is doing in your life, but he is doing what is good, what is best for you for all of eternity. You are in his grace. You are in his favor. You have access to the grace of God. Well, also here in verse two, we find the third result of justification, and that is that you can rejoice in hope. There at the end of verse two, he says, and rejoice in hope because

of the glory of God. So not only do you have peace with God, and not only do you have access to grace, but you can rejoice in hope. Now I changed up the words a little bit there on purpose because, well, you have peace with God. Whether you feel like it or not, whether you think so or not, as a believer in Jesus, you have peace with God.

And you can't take that away. You can't do anything about that. You have peace with God and you have access to grace. Even if you are disregarding God, even if you don't care about God, even if you think something else or do things wrong, even if you're not pursuing God, you have access to grace. God's working on your behalf. You're in his favor. But when it comes to rejoicing,

I think here's where we have a little bit of a choice to make. You can, you get to rejoice. You have peace with God. You have access to grace and you can rejoice in hope. Now the hope he says is of the glory of God. And as he talks about the hope of the glory of God, he's speaking about eternity with God.

He's talking about that future glory that God has in store. As an example of that, here's 1 Thessalonians 2, verse 12, where Paul encourages the Thessalonians to walk worthy of God, who calls you into his own kingdom and glory.

It's the looking forward to that eternal condition of glory with God, where we will be like him. We shall see him as he is, where we'll be transformed from glory to glory. The glory of God is our hope that is being in eternity with God. And so this is our hope, the hope of the glory of God. Now, as we talk about hope, it's always important to point out the Bible uses hope

quite differently than we use the word hope today. We use the word hope with some element of doubt in it. I hope that happens. You know, I hope my team wins. I hope I win the lottery. I hope I turned off the oven before I left the house. I hope, and there's this doubt, there's this uncertainty. I don't know, but I hope so. But when Paul's using this word hope, there's no element of doubt in

It's not in that same way. Instead, I would describe hope as a joyful and confident expectation. A joyful and confident expectation. I think if you'd like to maybe get a little bit better picture of what this verse means, replace the word hope with certainty. And so there at the end of verse two, he says, "'And rejoice in certainty of the glory of God.'"

We get to rejoice in the certainty of the glory of God. That is, as a believer in Jesus, having been justified by faith, eternity in heaven is not a maybe. It's not a quite possibly. It's not a most likely. It's an absolute certainty. You have been justified. And so therefore, you are guaranteed eternity with God.

You have an absolute guaranteed future ahead of you that is full of glory, the glory of God. And so Warren Wiersbe points out, you have peace with God that takes care of the past. You have access to God's grace. That's your present. You stand in that grace and you have the hope of the glory of God. That speaks of your future, right?

And so God's got you covered because you've believed in Jesus, past, present, and future. You're taken care of. You're right in his sight. You're declared not guilty. You're declared righteous. And you have this future that is guaranteed for you. It's an absolute certainty. And so you can rejoice. The word rejoice, it's often translated to glory, right?

There's this idea of glorying or boasting or exalting because of something. I would ask you to consider, what do you boast about? And you say, well, I never boast about anything because boasting is a sin. Well, boasting is a sin when you boast about the wrong things. Paul said, hey, I'm not going to boast about myself, but I'll boast about Jesus because

Boasting is appropriate as long as the thing that you're boasting about is worthy of the boast. And Paul says, look, here's something that you can boast about. Your absolute certainty of eternity with God. You can boast about the glory that is to come. Now, again, this is directly tied to justification by faith. If being right with God was on the basis of works, then

then boasting would be something altogether different. Because then you could boast about how well you do, how great you are, how amazing your good works are, and how wonderful you have become. And so you're boasting all about you if you're boasting. But because justification is by faith,

that is you can't earn it, you can't deserve it, there's nothing that you can do, the only thing that you can do is receive it, then the boast is not on you. The boast is about God. You're boasting about God's grace. You're boasting about God's promises. You're boasting about what God has done. You're boasting about Him. And so he says you can rejoice in hope. You can boast in hope.

Maybe another word that would help us understand it is you can celebrate. What do you celebrate? Maybe you celebrate when your team wins and then you go boasting about them, telling all the other haters, you know, hey, my team won over your team, whatever. I'm not a sports guy, so fill in the blanks, okay? What do you celebrate? Paul says you can celebrate in hope, in the absolute guarantee of the eternity of

that you have with God. Celebrate that. Once a year, perhaps you celebrate your birthday, but every day you can celebrate eternity. In fact, we should have cake every day to celebrate eternity, right? Just kidding. Celebrate, boast, rejoice. That is something that is provided. That's the result of you being justified by faith.

so that it doesn't change from day to day. If you're good today, you can rejoice in that hope. And if you weren't so good today, maybe you don't know if you should rejoice because maybe you're not going to have that. No, this is a guarantee because it's been based on what Christ has done for you and you've been justified by faith. You can rejoice in hope. And then finally, the fourth result of justification by faith is

Looking at verses three through five, you can glory in tribulation. Similar to the first point, you get an option here. You get to choose. You have peace with God. You have access to God's grace. And God is working on your behalf. He's working for your best interests always. And so you can rejoice in hope. You can boast in that glory that is to come. And you can...

You get to choose. You have the option. You can glory in tribulation. He says in verse 3, and not only that, so not only do you get to rejoice in hope of the glorious eternity ahead of you. Now, if you didn't know what was coming, you'd be like,

You know, on top of heaven, you get, you know, something else amazing. And we'd be really excited about it. But he goes on to say, not only that, but we also glory in tribulations. And you're like, Paul, you went a different direction than I was expecting there.

Like, not only do you get cake on your birthday, but you get to get smacked as well. Well, that's not that exciting, you know. If you say, you get cake and you get presents, well then, okay, yeah, I'll take that, right? But he says, you get a glory in eternity, you get to rejoice in that, and you get to glory in tribulations. Right?

He goes on to say, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance, verse 4, and perseverance character, and character hope. So Paul says we glory in tribulations. Now this word glory is the same word that we've just been talking about in verse 2, where he says to rejoice in hope.

So you can glory in the hope of eternity that you have, and you can glory in the tribulations that you will experience while you wait for that eternity. So you can celebrate your eternity, and you can celebrate your tribulations. Same word, Paul's saying the same thing. You can celebrate, you can boast, you can rejoice in the future of what is to come, and you

This is an important element of being justified. You can celebrate, you can boast, you can rejoice in the tribulation that you will experience. How is that? Tribulation is not something that we enjoy. The word tribulation means to crush, to press, to

to squeeze. It's not talking about a mild discomfort, like, you know, a little bit crowded in the subway car, you know, like a little bit uncomfortable. It's talking about a grievous affliction, like the worst things that you've ever gone through type of affliction, like terrible crushings, very difficult things. Now, Jesus said, in this world, you will have tribulation. And we know that's promised to us.

And so it's not that he's talking about weird, unusual tribulations that'll happen to believers. He's talking about, no, you're going to have tribulations. It's normal. It's to be expected. You're going to be crushed and pressed and squeezed. And in the midst of that, he says, you can glory. Now, this isn't just about having joy, even though things are difficult.

That's also biblical. And of course, we've talked about that before. In the book of James, you know, count it all joy as you face various trials, right? That you can have joy in the midst of trial. But there's more to what Paul is saying here in Romans chapter 5.

Not only can you rejoice or exalt or boast or celebrate your tribulations or have that celebration in the midst of the tribulation, but he says you can boast because of your tribulations. One commentator put it this way, Paul did not exalt because of the tribulations themselves, but because of their beneficial effect upon his Christian life.

This the saint must learn to do. You, saint. And yes, you are a saint because you've been justified, declared not guilty, declared righteous. You must learn to exalt, to glory in what God does through tribulation in your life. And so it's not just that you

Rejoice in the midst of tribulation. But he ends verse 3 saying, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance. And so you can exalt, you can glory, you can boast, you can celebrate tribulation because you know that God is doing something with that tribulation. That that tribulation produces in you something good.

And what does it produce? Well, first he says it produces perseverance. The word perseverance, it speaks of a cheerful endurance. It's talking about going through difficult circumstances with joy, being cheerful. And so tribulation produces cheerful endurance.

It's a good quality. It's a quality that God wants you to have. It's a quality that Jesus had, and he modeled it for us and calls us to follow him. And so we are to have this cheerful endurance. But how do you get this cheerful endurance? By tribulation. And so God uses tribulation in your life to produce the character of Jesus in you so that you have cheerful endurance.

endurance. It speaks of a quality that does not surrender to circumstances or succumb under trial. You don't give up. You don't give up on God because things get tough. You don't give up on life because things get tough. You don't give up on people because things get tough. You don't give up because the circumstances are hard. But tribulation produces this cheerful endurance.

And then Paul goes on to say that perseverance, that cheerful endurance produces character. Now the word character, it speaks about a proving or it's a proof. And so it's speaking about you endure through the trial cheerfully and you come out the other end having proved that God has done a work.

I like what one commentator, Harrison, said. He said, the newborn child of God is precious in his sight, but the tested and proven saint means even more to him. Newborn child of God, beautiful, precious. There's those proven saints. They've gloried in tribulation. They've endured cheerfully. Their character has been proven. And they're proving not themselves. They're proving God.

They're proving that God is at work. They're proving that he is in their midst. They're proving that he is in control. They're proving God. Spurgeon talked about Christians should have the attitude of, I believe in God. I believe in what God has done for me. And go ahead, test that with whatever you want to try. He talked about entering into eternity with a faith that's proven, tested, and tried.

Not with something that's never been challenged, but entering into eternity with a proven faith. Yeah, bang on it if you want to. Throw whatever you can at it. He wanted his faith to be proven, to be tested. And so this tribulation produces perseverance. It produces character. It produces proof that God is at work. And then that produces hope.

It produces hope in your life. As you see God at work, as you see God is transforming you, and where you once would blow up in the face of circumstances, now you're remaining steadfast in the midst of circumstances. Where you once would give up in the midst of circumstances, now you persist. Now you continue and endure in the midst of circumstances, and it gives you hope.

Because you can see that God is at work. And so the word hope, again, it's a joyful and confident expectation. And so as you see the evidence that God is at work in your life, it helps you to rejoice in hope because God is at work. He really is alive. He really has transformed you. He really is working in your best interest. You really do have peace with God. You really do have access to grace. And so you can rejoice in hope.

Dave Guzik says, I would rather have God just sprinkle perseverance and character and hope on me as I sleep. I could wake up a much better Christian, but that isn't God's plan for me or for any Christian. How does God build these characteristics in us? Through tribulation. And so you can glory in tribulation because of what it does in you, of what it produces in you.

In verse 5, he says, Now, verse 5 kind of leads into next week's passage. So I'm not going to dig into this too much this evening. But he says this hope that is produced as a result of tribulation, producing perseverance, producing, I forgot already, character, and then character producing hope,

this hope that is produced, it does not disappoint. That is, you don't get to the end of it and then you're like, oh no, it didn't happen the way I thought it was going to happen. Now you're ashamed because you've been boasting and then it didn't happen. You ever done that? You boast about something, you know, you got the raise, you got the job, whatever, and then, oh wait, never mind. You have to go back and you're ashamed.

You're disappointed. You were confident. You had it. But then, oh, oops, I spoke too soon. I don't have it. He says, hope does not disappoint. This hope that we have in the glory that is to come, it does not disappoint. He says, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts.

hope does not disappoint because God has already proven his love for us. And we'll get into that next week in Romans chapter five, verse eight. God demonstrates his own love toward us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. And so this hope is guaranteed because God has ultimately once and for all proven his love in that he died on the cross for us. And so there's no way this hope will disappoint.

Because God has proven his love. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. And so the point is, you can glory in tribulation. Now, this idea of glorying in tribulation, of course, it's difficult for us because we really don't like tribulation. And like Dave Guzik, I would wish God would sprinkle these characteristics in me as I sleep. Just, yeah, just give them to me overnight and I'll just wake up

an awesome believer in Jesus. But God builds these things. He produces these things through tribulation. You have peace with God because you're justified. You believe in Jesus. You're justified by faith. You don't have to work for it. You can't earn it. You can't add to it after you've received it.

the justification by faith. You are declared not guilty. You're declared righteous. And so you have peace with God. And that's really important. It should help you then to glory in tribulation because then you can know in the midst of tribulation, this isn't God trying to punish me. God's not against me. He's not out to get me. I have peace with God. Now, this is hugely important because I've had times in my life where I thought,

God's out to get me. God's against me. He's fighting against me. That's why there's this tribulation. I've met plenty of other Christians who look at circumstances, look at things in their life, and they say,

God's out to get me. God's against me. He's working against me. He's trying to, you know, punish me for something that I've done. And there's always this battle that comes. The enemy will come against you, especially in the midst of tribulation. And he'll say, it's because of this. And he accuses the brethren. He accuses you right to your face. And he says, you are a loser. You're a lousy person. You might not even be saved. And that's why God's treating you this way.

And that's why you need to know Romans chapter five, because you have peace with God. Your tribulation is not because God's against you if you believe in Jesus. You have peace with God because you're justified by faith. And the result is peace. There is no enmity between you and God. And the result is grace. You have access to grace. That is that you stand in peace.

Right relationship with God. You stand in a position of God's favor. And this is really important because in the midst of tribulation, the enemy is going to come against you. Your own mind is going to come against you. And maybe even some people around you and some Christians around you will say you're out of God's favor. It's because you fill in the blank, whatever they say, whatever you say, whatever the enemy tells you. As a believer in Jesus, you have access to the grace of God.

You have been introduced, you have been ushered in, and you stand in favor with God. And God is working on your behalf. That's why Paul later on is going to be able to say, God works all things together for good to those who love God and are called according to his purpose. God works all things together for good because you have access to his grace. You're standing in the waterfall of his grace. He's pouring out his grace on you and he's working together everything for good.

Because you are justified. You are not guilty and you are declared righteous. So you can rejoice in hope. This is another attack. You're going through tribulation. You're being crushed. You're being squeezed and the enemy comes against you. Your mind starts speaking against you. Maybe people around you start saying, maybe you're not even saved. You might not even make it to heaven.

Pastor Sisco was telling me about something that happened this last Sunday evening. We've been out at a church in La Habra doing the Equipped to Serve course. I'm doing it in English, and he's doing it in Spanish. And so we're teaching the church down there about serving the Lord. And he was cracking up, and we were driving home. He was telling me there was this one guy who kind of like interrupted as Pastor Sisco was talking about something. And the guy said, well, if that's true, then a lot of people are going to hell. And he said, well, if that's true, then a lot of people are going to hell.

And then a couple points later, he said, oh. And then his wife said, yeah, you're going to hell too, bud. And there was this condemnation as a result of, you know, well, that was this guy's perspective. Now, that happens a lot of times. People think, yeah, you're not going to make it. You might think, I'm not going to make it, especially as you're going through tribulation. Look what I'm experiencing. Look what I'm suffering through. God must hate me.

Maybe God doesn't love me. Maybe I'm not saved. Paul says, you got to understand what justification is all about. You got to understand the results. You have peace with God. You have access to grace. And so you can rejoice in hope. You can glory in the future that is to come. It's guaranteed because you are declared not guilty. You are declared righteous by faith in Jesus Christ.

It's past tense. It's done. You believe, you're justified, and so you can glory. And in the midst of tribulation, when those attacks come against your hope, you need to go back to Romans chapter 5 and remember, you can rejoice in hope. And so whatever tribulation you experience, it's not God's judgment on you. It's not God's judgment on you.

I love Psalm 103, lots of powerful nuggets in there. And one of the things that the psalmist says in Psalm 103 is that God has not dealt with us according to our sin. God never deals with you according to your sin. He's not trying to pay you back. And so he gives you tribulation. You can rejoice. You can glory. You can celebrate in tribulation because it's not judgment if you're a believer in Jesus. It's not judgment, but it's producing tribulation.

God's using it. He's molding you. He's shaping you. He's at work. It's evidence of his love for you. It's evidence of your eternal home with him. It's evidence of him working in your life to produce in you the character of Jesus Christ. God is at work. You are going to experience crushing so that God can do the work in you that he desires to do, that needs to be done.

So these are the results of justification. These are powerful truths that should change the way we think, that should change the way that we operate, that we don't live according to how we feel or what we think or what people say or what the enemy tells us. But this is the truth that God has revealed. When you believe in Jesus Christ, you are justified. You're declared not guilty and you're declared righteous. And so therefore you have peace with God.

And therefore, you stand in the waterfall of his grace. And therefore, you can rejoice in the glorious future that he's promised. You can boast about eternity. You can celebrate eternity. It's guaranteed. But then you can also celebrate and boast in tribulation because God is using that to work in your life. He's using that to produce in you his character, his nature, his

to make you more like him. Amazing what God has done for us. If salvation were by works, all of this would be different. Then every time there was tribulation, it was like, I didn't work hard enough. I didn't do good enough. Salvation is by faith. You are justified by faith. And so these things are guaranteed. You have peace. You have access. You can rejoice and you can glory in tribulation. Let's pray.

Lord, we thank you for your goodness towards us, your amazing grace that you relate to us as if we never sinned because we believe in you. That's incredible. And I pray, God, that you would help us to not then live in poverty when you've given us riches, to not live in condemnation when you've forgiven us. Help us, God, to believe you at your word, to enjoy the peace that you have provided us

with us and for us. Help us, Lord, to enjoy the hope that you've promised to us. Help us to receive the grace that you extend towards us. And Lord, help us to do all of these things, even in the midst of great suffering and affliction, because we know we're in your hands and you have declared us not guilty and completely righteous. You've proven your love, and so we can rest assured your promises are true. You want what's best.

And you will be faithful to complete it until the very end. Thank you, God, for your goodness towards us. Help us to walk in that. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.