At the very opening of this epistle we are told that what God seeks of the sinner is “the obedience of faith.” We might religiously judge that love and its services would be more acceptable to Him. But it is neither conformity with law nor the rendering of love that God looks for from us as lost sinners, but “the obedience of faith.” And when we think of it, this is the only form of obedience that a sinner can render and God accept. He is honored as a Saviour by our faith, and this gets Him richer glory than any honor we might have rendered by conformity to His statutes as a Lawgiver, for it owns and honors Him as He is revealed in the grace of the Gospel, and in obeying Him thus we honor Himself. The early chapters of our epistle speak to us on this great subject, they deal with faith as it is first awakened in a sinner. And as chapter 1:5 goes on to tell, this obedience of faith which the sinner receiving the Gospel renders to God, is “for His Name,” which surely intimates how His glory is concerned in it, and that it is the most welcome honor that His Name can receive from a ruined sinner who is being led through that reconciliation which is proclaimed in the Gospel back to Himself. And we further learn from these opening words of our epistle (verse 17) that this faith so exercised possesses itself of the highest dignity that a creature is capable of, that is, “the righteousness of God.” The creature can stand in no dignity more marvelous than this.
It is in this connection that we further learn, in chapter 3:22-26, that the Object upon which faith thus lays hold to obtain this Divine righteousness is “Jesus” and His “blood.” A crucified Saviour is ever the object that faith apprehends, and to Whom it clings. We further learn that “the righteousness of God,” in which this believing sinner stands, is found “by faith of Jesus Christ,” and is “unto all and upon all them that believe.” It is very blessed to know this. If God gets His highest glory from a sinner's faith, that sinner gets from God the highest dignity which it is possible for man to possess. It makes him what he is. It sets him in his due form and personality before God. And faith in the blood of Christ apprehends it. Under the eye of faith, God has set forth a propitiation — a mercy-seat. Faith standing there learns that God is Just and yet a Justifier. His throne is maintained in righteousness by the blood that is sprinkled there. The death of the Son of God has given to that throne all that it demanded, it has accomplished reconciliation in the way of maintaining righteousness while answering for sin. And thus the blessed God in the Gospel of His grace proclaims that a full satisfaction has been found to meet all His just demands on the sinner. Righteousness had called for judgment upon sin, but grace provides the sinner with a shelter in the blood-stained mercy-seat. And faith uses it. It accepts God's gift. The believing sinner pleads His answer and is saved. And thus it is that faith becomes the first link between God and the soul.
This doctrine exposes and humbles us, for it tells how incurably and irrecoverably bad we are in ourselves and under the law. It “excludes boasting,” for while it assures us that we are made “the righteousness of God,” that we have the place of “children,” with present peace and grace and joy, with possession of the love of God in its measureless fullness, it leaves no room for a sinner to boast, for all is of grace. Thus while it confers upon us it also denies us. These are some of the great facts taught us in chapters 1-5 of this epistle. All this displays and glorifies God, while it discerns the moral glories of this precious doctrine of faith. The Gospel presents God in the fullness of His combined grace and righteousness to His entire creation in the highest forms of moral glory. It reveals Him as the doer of all the work and the inheritor of all the glory. And it puts Him thus alike before Jews and Gentiles. For in answer to the question: “Is He the God of the Jews only!” the word is, “Nay, but of the Gentiles also.” This truth of justification by faith is never dealt with as a mere scholastic proposition. It is the religion of a convicted sinner's personal immediate confidence in God, enjoyed on a title which God Himself has written out for him.
In Romans 3-4 the death of Christ is set forth as accomplishing reconciliation while maintaining righteousness in answering for sin, and the sinner laying hold on this is justified. Chapter 5 sets him in peace before God, giving access to a present state of grace and providing a sure hope of glory. It renders a reason why he is able to glory in tribulations on the way; it introduces him to the perfect love of God, and tells of his interest in the present life of Christ beyond death, and it reveals God Himself as the source of his joy.
Romans 6-8 tells of the believing sinner's deliverance from sin as master, from the law as husband, and from the flesh as the law of his being. In our unregenerate state sin was our master and we his willing bondmen. But death dissolved the bond and set the captive free. For “he that is dead is freed (justified) from sin.” The old master has no more claim. We are no longer his servants. This is the wondrous teaching of chapter 6. And in chapter 7 the believer, as one dead and risen with Christ, is freed from the law as husband. For the law addresses itself to those who are alive in the flesh, but the believer having died with Christ is discharged from its claims and is now acted upon by the virtues of Him to Whom in resurrection he is now united. In chapter 8 he is seen “in Christ,” where there is no condemnation; freed from the law of sin and death, no longer “in the flesh,” but in Christ, with the Spirit of God dwelling in him, living in triumph, “more than conqueror” through Him in Whom he now stands before God. Thus in this epistle we have the moral glory of the Gospel of God set forth and proved, with its blessed results to faith evidenced in the present condition of all believing sinners.
It is the purpose of this great epistle, at least in its doctrinal parts, to set forth the excellencies of God's grace and of that faith in a sinner which apprehends and enjoys the blessings which grace brings.
In Romans 1-8 we see the Divine counsel and way of God set forth, in which ruined sinners are brought back to God and set in peace before Him in closest relationship to Himself all in grace. And the language at the close of this section of the epistle is a triumph of the conscience in virtue of the riches of God's grace and the work of Christ.
In Romans 9-11, where we are instructed in the counsels and wisdom of God in His dispensational actings, the delighted and instructed understanding of the saints triumph over the riches of God's wisdom and knowledge. Thus, whether it be the secret of peace which the blood of Christ has purchased and the relationship which grace bestows, or the glory which grace sets before him, all is of God and all of boundless grace.