Romans 5

Peace with God, Rejoicing in Grace, and Life Through the One Man Jesus Christ

Paul moves from the benefits of justification, to rejoicing in suffering because of Spirit-poured love, to assurance grounded in Christ's death for enemies, and then to the Adam-Christ contrast where grace reigns through righteousness to eternal life.

World English Bible, Public Domain

Justified believers have peace with God, access into grace, and hope in God's glory through Christ.

Romans 5:1-11

Justification produces peace with God and confident hope because Christ has reconciled us and secured our future salvation.

1 Being therefore justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ;

2 through whom we also have our access by faith into this grace in which we stand. We rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Suffering becomes a pathway of formation because God's love has been poured into believers by the Holy Spirit.

3 Not only this, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces perseverance;

4 and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope:

5 and hope doesn’t disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

God demonstrates his love by Christ's death for powerless sinners.

6 For while we were yet weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.

7 For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Yet perhaps for a righteous person someone would even dare to die.

8 But God commends his own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Those justified by Christ's blood and reconciled by his death will certainly be saved through his life.

9 Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we will be saved from God’s wrath through him.

10 For 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.

11 Not only so, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation.

Sin and death entered the world through Adam, and death reigned even before the Mosaic law.

Romans 5:12-21

Where Adam’s trespass brought condemnation and death, Christ’s obedience brings justification and reigning life, and grace abounds beyond sin.

12 Therefore as sin entered into the world through one man, and death through sin; so death passed to all men, because all sinned.

13 For until the law, sin was in the world; but sin is not charged when there is no law.

14 Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those whose sins weren’t like Adam’s disobedience, who is a foreshadowing of him who was to come.

God's grace in Christ overflows beyond Adam's trespass, bringing righteousness and reigning life.

15 But the free gift isn’t like the trespass. For if by the trespass of the one the many died, much more did the grace of God, and the gift by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abound to the many.

16 The gift is not as through one who sinned; for the judgment came by one to condemnation, but the free gift came of many trespasses to justification.

17 For if by the trespass of the one, death reigned through the one; so much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ.

Adam's disobedience results in condemnation, while Christ's obedience results in justification and righteousness.

18 So then as through one trespass, all men were condemned; even so through one act of righteousness, all men were justified to life.

19 For as through the one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the one, many will be made righteous.

Where sin increased, grace increased all the more and now reigns through righteousness to eternal life.

20 The law came in that the trespass might abound; but where sin abounded, grace abounded more exceedingly;

21 that as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Key Terms

δικαιωθέντες dikaiōthentes G1344
πίστεως pisteōs G4102
εἰρήνην eirēnēn G1515
προσαγωγὴν prosagōgēn G4318
χάριν charin G5485
ἑστήκαμεν hestēkamen G2476
ἐλπίδι elpidi G1680
δόξης doxēs G1391
θλίψεσιν thlipsesin G2347
ὑπομονήν hypomonēn G5281
δοκιμήν dokimēn G1382
καταισχύνει kataischynei G2617

World English Bible (WEB): Public Domain Scripture text · License details