I love the above cartoon. It explains the necessity of the cross quite simply. To diminish the divinity of Christ takes away His ability to bring us to God. To diminish our sin might make our life easier and more convenient, but in the end we will find our sin still standing between us and God. There is only one way to bridge the great chasm that separates us from God, and this is accomplished through the death of Jesus. No one else can bridge the gap because no one else paid the debt. No one else offered themselves as a sinless sacrifice for sinful people. Upon the cross one Man offered one sacrifice for all people. And it is only through this one Man that humanity might be saved.
This is the story of the Bible in nutshell. God creates man. Man rejects God. God begins developing a plan to rescue man without breaking any of His laws. God sends Jesus to die in man’s place. Man accepts God’s offer of peace. Man gains eternal life. That’s the message of the Bible when you set aside all the theology and the different ways of practicing the faith. It really is a simple message. And it really is Good News. This is what Paul is trying to teach in the book of Romans. He explains God’s plan of redemption to his readers. It is a plan based upon faith. And when a sinful person places their faith in God's Son, they are at peace with God. God provides humanity a way to break free from sin and death, and instead find righteousness and life (Read Romans 5:12-21).
Setting the stage for chapter six, Paul reminds us that a Christian has moved from death to life; from being under the curse of sin to freedom in righteousness. And what is the curse of sin that has marked each of us? It is death. When Adam disobeyed a direct command from God, God pronounced judgment against that sin. Death was introduced into this world as the result of that sin. And every person born since the beginning has inherited that curse (you do realize that every human being that has lived since Adam and Eve have been a recreation, not a new creation). This is what Paul is pointing out here. Death became a part of this world because of Adam’s sin. And whether a person knows God’s Laws or not does not mean they are sinless (a person can’t break the law when there is no law to break). The fact that they die is an indication of their sin. Death is the mark of sin.
Each of us has been born into sin. And this fact is true, says Paul, because all people die. And honestly, the only way to escape this would to be born outside of the natural process where the seed of a man combines with the seed of a woman. You and I simply have no choice. To be born is to be born with the mark of sin. There is no way to escape this. There is only one way possible to conceive a human being. Even cloning is simply another way of recreating. The clone would still inherit the sin nature and be destined to die. We have no choice. Even if it is in a petri dish or a test tube, it’s still the same. We are marked by death. However, we do have a choice in being born again, which is to be spiritually reborn. We make that choice by believing in faith that Jesus paid the sacrifice for our sin. And because of our faith in Jesus, God removes the mark of sin (which is death) and replaces it with the mark of life (the Holy Spirit). In Adam all have the mark of sin because of death (see verse 17). But in Christ all have the mark of salvation because of eternal life.
Now I know some might argue that even believers die, so where is this “eternal life” that God promised. But those who ask such a question are only looking at things from an earthly perspective. They are not looking at things from a Spiritual perspective. Paul says that, “our physical bodies cannot inherit the Kingdom of God. These dying bodies cannot inherit what will last forever” (1 Corinthians 15:50). So the lesson Paul is teaching here transcends the physical and speaks more to the spiritual. Truthfully, even though a person’s heart still beats and even though there is breath in their lungs, they are still dead from a spiritual perspective. They are dead in their relationship with God. They show no signs of Spiritual life.
This is the great deception of Satan. He has hypnotized the world into believing that there is life apart from God. But there is no greater lie than this. Apart from God there is no life. There is only sadness, sorrow, slavery, and death. Apart from God a person is empty of life. Satan wants us to think that life is only what we can see, hear, feel, touch, and taste. But God, on the on the other hand, offers us life; a life no longer ruled by sin and by death, but a life free from bondage and slavery.
We all have inherited death; both a physical death and a spiritual death. And there is nothing we can do to keep this from happening. But God, in His great mercy, has provided a way to escape the spiritual death. We will all die physically, but we need not die spiritually. This is God’s Good News. Through faith in Christ we can find life.
And now to the questions:
I was asked to explain what Paul meant in Romans 5:7 (Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good). To understand this verse, it must be read in conjunction with verse 8 (But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners). Paul is painting a contrast here. There are probably certain people someone would be willing to die for. I would gladly sacrifice my life for the lives of my family. But Paul’s point here is that not only would Jesus sacrifice Himself for the good and upright person in our community, but also the town drunk, the homeless person, the village prostitute, and the murderer in the county jail. This is the difference that separates Jesus from the rest of the crowd. He died for the people we would not.
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