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BIBLICAL THEOLOGY OF PAUL’S LETTER TO THE ROMANS
Many modified Calvinist saw that the penal satisfaction theory of atonement is Biblically inadequate because it does not include the Biblical doctrine of the believer as being in Christ. They saw that the Apostle Paul, after setting forth the truth of justification through faith in Christ’s death for us in chapters 3 through 5 of Romans, went on to set forth in chapter 6 of Romans the believer’s identification with Christ’s death. In chapters 3 to 5, they believed that Paul presented Christ’s death as for us; but in chapter 6 they believe that Paul presented our death with Christ. According to their interpretation, in chapter 6 of Romans our justification is no mere formal or legal transaction (although it is essentially a legal matter), but that it is an union with Christ. In justification, God declares the ungodly just by the imputation of the righteousness earned by Christ’s active obedience during His life before the cross where in His passive obedience Christ paid the penalty of our sins. This legal declaration and imputation is made apart from a real and deep life-union of the believer with Christ. In chapter 6 of Romans, Paul sets forth our identification and our union with Christ in His death which our baptism pictures as the likeness of Christ’s death and burial. Since we have been united to Christ crucified, our position must be one of death “in Him”. The death of Christ for all involves the death of all. We therefore died in Christ to sin. Paul asks, in Rom. 6:1: “Shall we therefore continue in sin?” Perish the thought. “In Christ” and “in sin”? What an ethical contradiction!
Christ dying for my sin involves inevitably my death with Christ to sin. Christ in His incarnation being identified with us as a man, having taken upon Himself the penalty of our sin, He also took us unto Himself, making us one with Himself. Thus we believers are legally and ethically involved in Christ. We have been sentenced to death in Christ for our sins, and at the same time we have automatically died to sin with Christ. As an old theologian put it, I am “born crucificed” (that is, when I was born again) [1].
As we saw above, this view of the atonement is a legalistic misinterpretation of Christ’s death. The penal substitutionary theory is a legalistic misunderstanding of the sacrifical aspect of the death of Christ. This view of Romans attempts to combine the Biblical doctrine of our death and resurrection with and in Christ with the legalistic penal substitutionary theory. But it leaves the believer under law and it is unable to deliever the believer from the slavery of sin.
“For sin shall not have dominion over you: for you are not under the law, but under grace.” (Rom. 6:14).
This legalistic interpretation of Christ’s death as penal substitutionary theory is based on a misinterpretation of Paul’s letter to the Romans. According to this interpretation of Romans, there are two aspects of salvation that are presented in first eight chapters of Romans. First, the forgiveness of our sins, and second, our deliverance from sin. In the first part of Roman, chapters 1 to 5, we are presented with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ shed for salvation (Rom. 3:26); in the second part, chapters 6 to the end of chapter 8, we are introduced to a new idea in 6:6 that we have been “crucified” with Christ. Thus an aspect of Christ’s representative work involves our union with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection. In the first part of Romans, the Blood deals with what has been done for us, and in the second part the Cross deals with what we are [2].
But according to the correct intrepretation of Romans, in the first part of Romans, from chapters 1:18 to 3:31, we are presented with the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ shed for our salvation from God’s wrath (Rom. 3:25 “propitiation by his blood”); in the second part of Romans, from chapter 4:1 to 5:11, we are presented with our salvation as from sin to righteousness (Rom. 4:5 “faith is reckoned as righteousness”); and in the third part of Romans, from chapters 5:12 to end of chapter 8, we are presented with our salvation as from death to life in Christ’s death and resurrection. In this third section, we are introduced to a new idea in 6:6 that our old man have been “crucified” with Christ and in 6:11 we are to consider ourselves “dead to sin and alive to God in Christ” risen from the dead.
Because God loves us, He has acted in the death and the resurrection of Jesus Christ for the salvation of man from death, sin and wrath. Since wrath is caused by sin (Rom. 1:18) and sin by death ( Rom. 5:12d ERS), salvation is basically from death to life and then from sin to righteousness and then from wrath to peace with God. Thus there are three aspects of salvation.
(1) propitiation is salvation from wrath to peace;
(2) redemption, is salvation from sin to righteousness; and
(3) Reconciliation is salvation from death to life.
These three aspects of salvation are accomplished in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Christ’s death is a propitiation because it is a redemption; and it is a propitiation and a redemption because it is a reconciliation to God.
These three aspects of salvation were accomplished in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Propitiation is the sacrificial aspect of His work, redemption is the liberation aspect of His work, and reconciliation is the representative aspect of His work of salvation. The Gospel tells us about this act of God for our salvation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ (I Cor. 15:3-4). And in the preaching of the Gospel, God exerts His power for the salvation of men by bringing them to faith in Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:16).
The key to the understanding of the death of Christ in the writings of the Apostle Paul is the Biblical doctrine of the representative man. This is the doctrine that Christ acted not for Himself alone but also for all men whom He represents. His death was not just the death of a man but was the death for all men. He died on their behalf (huper).
“For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for [on the behalf of, huper] all, therefore all died” (II Cor. 5:14),
that is, in Christ who represents us all. Similarly His resurrection is for us, on our behalf. His resurrection is our resurrection.
“And he died for [huper] all, that those who live might live no longer for [huper] themselves but for him who for their sakes [huper] died and was raised.” (II Cor. 5:15)
Paul sets this conception of Christ as the representative man in contrast to Adam as the representative man. Paul teaches, that Christ is “the last Adam” (I Cor. 15:45) and that Adam is “a type of one who is to come” ( Rom. 5:14).
In Romans 5:12-21, the Apostle Paul fully develops this doctrine of the two representative men pointing out the similarity and differences between them. Christ is similar to Adam in that as through Adam death reigns over many, so also through Christ many shall reign in life (Rom. 5:17). They both acted representatively on the behalf of all men. It is in connection with this similarity of Adam and Christ as the representative men that Paul uses the phrase “in Christ.” In I Cor. 15:21-22 Paul says,
” 21 For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” (I Cor. 15:21-22)
Note that the similarity of both men acting as representatives is brought out by the use of the similar phrase “in Adam” and “in Christ.” But it should also be noted that it is impossible to speak of the similarity between Adam and Christ without at the same time speaking of their differennces. Through Adam — death; through Christ — life. Paul is not here speaking of just physical death and physical life, but also of spiritual death and spiritual life. Through Adam, men not only are going to die physically but are in a state of spiritual death — separation from God. Men do not die physically and spiritually because of their own sins but because of Adam’s sin; Adam (and Eve) are the only ones of the human race who died because of their own sin. Adam’s descendants die and are born into a state of spiritual death because of Adam’s sin, not because of their own sins. (See Rom. 5:13-14)
I believe that the last clause of Rom. 5:12 [eph ho pantes hemarton] is incorrectly translated in our English versions [“because all sinned” RSV, NAS, NIV]; it makes it appear that each man dies because of his own sin which is just the opposite of what Paul says in the next verses. [See the section Death and Sin for my interpretation and translation of this clause.]) So similarly, through Christ, not only will men be made alive physically in the future resurrection but they are also now being made alive spiritually in the new birth. Men are not made alive spiritually and physically because of their own righteousness but because of Christ’s act of righteousness and obedience (Rom. 5:18-19).
And so we cannot speak of the difference between Adam and Christ without speaking of their similarity. Christ acting representatively brings life to all men as Adam acting representatively brought death to all men. All men die because of another, so also they are made alive because of another.
But there is another difference between the representative work of Christ and that of Adam; Christ’s representative act is a participation but Adam’s representative act is not a participation. All men died in Adam but did not sin in Adam; they did not participate in Adam’s act of sin. Nowhere in the Scriptures does it say that “all men sinned in Adam.” The words “in Adam” have been added to the last phrase of Romans 5:12 by those commentators who believe this doctrine that death passed unto all men, because all sinned in Adam. Nowhere in the Scriptures does it teach that all men sinned in Adam. On the contrary, this interpretation appears to contradict what Paul says in verse 14:
“5:12 Therefore, as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death passed unto all men,
because of which all sinned: – ” (Rom. 5:12 ERS)
“5:13 sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. 5:14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.” (Rom. 5:13-14 RSV)
If all men sinned when Adam sinned, then they all would have sinned after the likeness of Adam’s transgression. But those from Adam to Moses did not sin after the likeness of Adam’s transgression because there was no law from Adam to Moses. So all did not sin in Adam. Thus this Reformed doctrine of original sin is unscriptural. (See my discussion of this doctrine in the section The Misunderstanding of the Origin of Sin).
But the representative work of Christ is a participation. But it should not be understood as a vicarious act done instead of and in the place of another. As a participation, it is a sharing in the act of another. Thus there are two sides to Christ’s representative work: Christ took part or shared our situation and thereby we come to take part or share in His situation. As Irenaeus said: “He became like us that we might become like Him.” [3]
Concretely, the Son of God entered not only into our existence as a man, but He also entered into our condition of physical and spiritual death. On the cross, He died not only physically but spiritually. For only this once during His whole life was He separated from the Father.
“My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” (Matt. 26:46) He was forsaken for us; He died for us. He entered into and shared in our spiritual and physical death. He tasted death for every man (Heb. 2:9).
“2:14 Since therefore the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; 2:15 and deliver all those who through fear of death
were subject lifelong bondage.” (Heb. 2:14-15)
But God raised Him from the dead. He entered into our death in order that as He was raised from the dead we might be made alive with Him (Eph. 2:5). Hence, Christ’s death was our death, and His resurrection is our resurrection. He participated in our death that we might participate in His resurrection and have life, spiritual and physical.
Because of this representative act of Christ on our behalf, by faith we can identify ourselves with Him in His death and resurrection. In faith we can say: “I have died with Christ and I have been raised from the dead with Christ. His death is my death; His resurrection is mine.” We can say with Paul,
“I have been crucified with Christ: and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (Gal. 2:20 ERS; see also Rom. 6:5-11; Eph. 2:4-6; Col. 3:1-4)
This is not a mystical experience for only those who have attained a higher level of spiritual devotion and holiness, but this is true of everyone who by faith will believe it and reckon it to be so (Rom. 6:11). Faith rests in the fact of what Christ did He did on our behalf.
To be in Christ is to be a participant in the representative work of Christ on our behalf. And to be in Christ is to be dead with Christ. But to be in Christ is also to be raised with Christ from the dead and to be alive to God in Him (Rom. 6:8-11). Having passed from death to life with Christ, all believers are in Christ. To be a Christian is to be in Christ. Though many, we are all one body in Christ (Rom. 12:5). But since Christ has also been exalted to God’s right hand, we also have been raised up with Him and made to sit with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus (Eph. 2:6). Those who were subject to death and in bondage to sin are now reigning as kings in life (Rom. 5:17), bringing forth fruit in true righteousness and holiness. The slaves have becomes kings reigning with Christ. Praise be to God for His love toward us in Christ Jesus (Rom. 8:39).
Nowhere in the Scriptures does it say that Christ died to pay the penalty of man’s sin and satisfy God’s justice. Not in the three passages (Rom. 3:25-26; II Cor. 5:21; Gal. 3:13) usually cited to support this doctrine does it say explicitly that Christ paid the penalty of sin or satisfied the justice of God. [4] Propitiation is not the satisfaction of God’s justice; “Being made sin” or “a curse” does not mean paying the penalty of sin. The introduction of these legalistic concepts into the interpretation of these passages has obscured their meaning and interpretation. Apart from the clear and explicit statement of Scripture, it cannot be assumed that this is what these verses mean. Since this legalism is contrary to the clear and explicit statements of Scripture, any interpretation employing these legalistic concepts is suspect. In fact the Scripture explicitly rejects the principle of vicarious penal sacrifice upon which this interpretation depends.
“The person who sins will die. The son will not bear the punishment for the father’s iniquity, nor will the father bear the punishment for the son’s iniquity; the righteousness of the righteous will be upon himself, and the wickedness of the wicked will be upon himself.” (Ezekiel 18:20 NAS; see also Deut. 24:16; Jer. 31:30).
If Christ did not die to pay the penalty for man’s sin and satisfy God’s justice, then why did Christ have to die to save man? Why then do men need to be saved? An examination of Scripture (John 10:10; Eph. 2:4-5; Heb. 2:14-15; I John 4:9; etc.) clearly shows that the answer to this question is that man needs to be saved because he is dead.
“2:4 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, 2:5 even when we were dead in failures, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),” (Eph. 2:4-5 ERS; see Rom. 6:8).
Salvation by God’s grace is from death to life. Man is separated and alienated from God (Eph. 4:8). He does not know God personally, and because he does not know the true God, he turns to false gods – to those things which are not God – and makes those into his gods (Gal. 4:8). The basic sin is idolatry (Ex. 20:2; Rom. 1:25), and man sins (chooses these false gods) because he is spiritually dead – separated from the true God.
All men have sinned because they are spiritually dead. This is what the Apostle Paul says in the last clause of Rom. 5:12d ERS):
“because of which [death] all sinned.” [5] Spiritual death which is “spread to all men” along with physical death is not the result of each man’s own personal sins. On the contrary, a man sins as a result of spiritual death. He received death from Adam, from his first parents. The historical origin of sin is the fall of Adam – the sin of the first man. [6] Adam’s sin brought death – spiritual and physical – on all his descendants (Rom. 5:12, 15, 17). [7] This spiritual death inherited from Adam is the personal, contemporary origin of each man’s sin. Because he is spiritually dead, not knowing the true God personally, he chooses something other than the true God as his god; he thus sins.
This is why a man needs to be saved. He is dead spiritually and dying physically. Man needs life – he needs to be made alive – to be raised from the dead. And if he receives life, if he is made alive to God, death which leads to sin is removed. And if death which leads to sin is removed, then man will be saved from sin. Thus salvation must be understood to be primarily from death to life and secondarily from sin to righteousness. And since God’s wrath – God’s “no” or opposition to sin – is caused by sin (Rom. 1:18), the removal of sin brings with it also the removal of wrath. No sin, no wrath. Salvation is then thirdly from wrath to peace with God (Rom. 5:1). Thus there are three aspects of salvation:
1. reconciliation is salvation from death to life;
2. redemption is salvation from sin to righteousness; and
3. propitiation is salvation from wrath to peace.
These three aspects of salvation were accomplished in and through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Propitiation is the sacrificial aspect of His work, redemption is the liberation aspect of His work, and reconciliation is the representative aspect of His work of salvation. The Gospel tells us about this act of God for our salvation in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ (I Cor. 15:3-4). And in the preaching of the Gospel, God exerts His power for the salvation of men by bringing them to faith in Jesus Christ (Rom. 1:16).
This salvation (from death, sin and wrath) is exactly what God accomplished through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, His Son. This is why Christ died, that He might be raised from the dead. Jesus entered into our spiritual death in order that as He was raised from the dead, we might be made alive in and with Him ( Eph. 2:5). And by saving us from spiritual death, Christ saves us from sin. It is by taking away the spiritual death, which leads to our sin, that God takes away our sin. Jesus died for our sins – literally – to take them away (John 1:29). What the Old Testament sacrifices could not do (Heb. 10:1-4) the death of Christ has done. The blood of Jesus (His death) cleanses us from our sins (I John 1:7). We are delivered from sin itself. We were saved from our trust in false gods when we put our trust in Jesus Christ and the true God who sent Him. We “turned from idols to serve the living and true God” (I Thess. 1:9). When we were spiritually dead, we trusted in and served those things that are not God – money, power, sex, education, popularity, pleasure, etc. But when we turned to the risen Christ, we entered into life, leaving behind those false gods. The risen Jesus Christ is now our Lord and our God (John 20:28).
The death and resurrection of Jesus was the means by which God removed death – the barrier to knowing God personally and knowing His love. In the preaching of the Gospel, God reveals Himself to us making us spiritually alive to Himself when we receive Jesus Christ who is the life (John 14:6; I John 5:12). To be spiritually alive is to know God personally, and to know God personally is to trust Him. For God is love (I John 4:8, 16) and love begets trust. The trust that God’s love invokes in us is righteousness (Rom. 4:5, 9); it relates us rightly to God. Thus by making us alive to Himself, God sets us right with Himself through faith. Life produces righteousness just as death produces sin.
Martin Luther recovered the Biblical concept of the righteousness of God and of the justification by faith. But his followers obscured this understanding of these concepts by the legalism of their theology and legalistic understanding of righteousness and justification. And this legalism not only affected the theology but the whole life of the church. The result of this legalism was dead orthodoxy and a cold, unloving Christianity. To correct these effects there arose in the church various movements such as pietism, the evangelical awakening, revivalism, etc. None of these movements went to the source of the deadness, coldness and unlovableness but just reinforced the cause — legalism.
Legalism is a temptation and an obstacle to the walk in the Spirit by faith. As good and right as the law is (Rom. 7:10), this law is not man’s highest good, and observing the Ten Commandments is not man’s righteousness. God Himself is man’s highest good, and trust in and love for God is his righteousness. This love fulfills the law (Rom. 13:8-10), which a legalistic living by the law does not do. Man’s basic problem is not “Are you keeping the law?” but “Which god are you trusting?” Is it the true God or is it a false one? This is not just the problem of the non-Christian and the unbeliever but also the problem of the Christian. Many psychological problems that Christians have are the result of a divided loyalty. They are trying to hang onto the true God and a false god at the same time. This double-mindedness, this divided faith (James 1:7-8) makes a Christian psychologically and morally unstable and hinders his walk with the Lord.
And strange as it may seem, this is the situation behind the Romans 7 kind of experience of many Christians. As we observed above, the experience of Romans 7 is the experience of the man under law. And if a Christian is having this kind of experience, it is because he has placed himself under law which God says he is not under, for he is under grace ( Rom. 6:14). He is attempting to serve two masters at the same time: the law and the Holy Spirit. And it cannot be done ( Gal. 5:18). It only creates psychological and moral problems: guilt on the inside and sin and failure on the outside. Being indwelt by the Holy Spirit, the Christian does not need to walk by the law but by the Spirit. The Christian’s goal is not moral perfection but the fruit of the Spirit (Gal. 5:22-23). The Apostle Paul’s question in Galatians 3:3 is particularly relevant and right to the point: “Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?”
Paul’s obvious answer to this rhetorical question is “No“. For “as you… have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him” (Col. 2:6). By faith they have received Christ so they walk in Him by faith in Him. This walk is not the striving for moral perfection. Moral perfection is perfection by the flesh, by the works of the law, and is contrary and opposed to the fruit of the Spirit and the righteousness of faith (Gal. 5:19-21). The weakness, if not the error, of most Christian preaching and teaching is that it is an exhortation of the Christian to perfection by the flesh, by the works of the law. Having begun in the Spirit, the Christian is urged to seek moral perfection. The Holy Spirit is brought into this kind of preaching, if at all, as the source of power to enable the Christian to keep the law. This Spirit-empowered law-keeping is not what Paul means when he speaks of “walking according to the Spirit” (Rom. 8:4; see also Gal. 5:16, 25). To walk by the Spirit is to be led by the Spirit, and if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law:
“But if you are led by the Spirit you are not under the law.” (Gal. 5:18).
To walk according to the Spirit is to make all one’s decisions with reference to the Holy Spirit as He personally guides, fills and empowers the believer. The walk in the Spirit is the moment by moment walk of faith and personal trust in the God who personally by His Holy Spirit reveals and communicates Himself along each step of that walk. The “normal” Christian life is this walk according to the Spirit and not a legalistic Spirit-empowered law-keeping, but a biblical Spirit-filled law-fulfillment by love (Rom. 8:4; 13:10).
Christian legalism not only ignores the clear statements of the Scriptures that the Christian is not under law ( Rom. 6:14), but also ignores the equally clear statements of the Scriptures that the Christian is dead to the law.
“Likewise, my brethren, you have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead in order that we may bear fruit to God.” (Rom. 7:4; Gal 2:19)
Not only is the Christian dead to sin but he is also dead to the law. Through Christ’s death the believer has died to sin and to the law, and now in the resurrected Christ he is alive to God.
“But now we are discharged from the law, dead to that which held us captive, so that we serve not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit.” (Rom. 7:6)
The Christian has passed from under the reign of death and sin unto reigning in life in Christ Jesus (Rom. 5:17). The law was the rule in the dispensation of death (II Cor. 3:6-7); the letter kills and the law condemns. The Holy Spirit is the rule of life in the new dispensation of life (II Cor. 3:17-18). Since the Spirit gives life (II Cor. 3:6), the dispensation of life is the dispensation of the Spirit (II Cor. 3:8), the Era of the Spirit. Since the Christian has passed from death to life, he has passed from the rule of the law to the rule of the Spirit. The law as the rule of Christian life has no place in the Era of the Spirit. And if the law has no place in the Era of the Spirit, legalism as an idolatry and misunderstanding of the law has no place in the Era of the Spirit either.
The great outpouring of the Spirit starting at the beginning of the twentieth century has been hindered and limited by the constant relapses into the same legalism. And the source of this legalism in practice is the legalism of the theology. The theological legalism produces the practical legalism. The answer to the legalism of the theology is not no theology, but a non-legaistic theology, a Biblical theology. With the present move of the Spirit, the time has come to clear the legalism out of our theology and again recover the Biblical understanding of the righteousness of God and justification by faith. This paper is an attempt to make a beginning at this theological renewal.