If you've ever wondered what makes the Christian life worth living, Romans chapter 5 holds the answer. After four chapters of sobering truth about humanity's desperate condition before God, Paul, the writer, suddenly shifts gears with a welcome bouquet of good news. It's as though God is saying, Christian, you're just beginning to discover the joys of walking with me. It only gets better and better. Today, on Insight for Living, Chuck Swindahl unpacks three life-changing benefits that become yours the moment you trust in Christ.
They're not rewards you earn. but gifts you immediately receive. The letter to the Romans represents the magnum opus of the Apostle Paul. in his writings. And when we get to the fifth chapter, this is one of those climactic.
sections that require concentration and attention to great truth. I have in my library the eight-volume set by Donald Gray Barnhouse. on the letter to the Romans, and he dedicates one entire volume to the first 11 verses of Romans 5. 220 pages. Be grateful I'm your pastor, not Donald Gray Barnhouse, huh?
No, don't be grateful. Would that all of us could hear him again. As he stood and delivered the good news of Christ to the people of Philadelphia. for uh more than twenty years. And uh what a marvelous Messenger of the gospel, he was.
He's the man who led S. Lewis Johnson to Christ. Dr. Johnson said to me when I was a student at Dallas Seminary, there was only one man who could have interested me. In spiritual things, as I look back on it, it was Donald Greg Barnhouse.
fluent in several languages, a scholar to the soles of his feet. but a dedicated servant who delivered the goods every time he preached. As I get to Romans 5, I have to pause and thank God for. the writings of this man who helped shape so much of my thinking. and the lives of other great men.
as well. Let me read for you these 11 verses of Romans 5, and you'll have an outline to. Place in the crease of your Bible as we finish, we'll return. in a few moments. Romans 5.1.
Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God. through our Lord Jesus Christ. through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace. in which we stand. And we exult.
In hope. of the glory of God. And not only this. But we also exult in our tribulations. knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance.
and perseverance proven character. and proven character, Hope. And hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. For while we were still helpless at the right time, Christ died. for the ungodly.
For one will hardly die for a righteous man. Though perhaps for the good man, someone would dare even to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners. Christ died for us. Much more than, having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from the wrath of God.
Through him. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God, Through the death of his son, much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved. by his life. And not only this. But we also exult in God.
God. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom We have now received The reconciliation. You're listening to Insight for Living. To dig deeper into the book of Romans on your own, be sure to purchase our Searching the Scriptures Bible Study workbook by going to insight.org/slash offer. Chuck titled today's message, Triumphant Joy.
My wife and I married young. Really young. I went with her for a week before I asked her to marry me. The reason I waited that long was to make sure she was the right one. A little over 18 months later, we got married.
She was 18 and I was 20. Mm-hmm. I signed three of her report cards to help her out of high school. Just kidding. Because we were so young, and because I had schooling to finish, and work to get finished with, and then a military obligation to get taken care of.
She and I decided we'd wait for a while to have Our families. A little over six years after we married, we began our family. In the early fall of 1961, our firstborn came along. Sun. And uh From his birth until the birth of our last, there were really a little less than nine years that passed.
Four children and nine years. We lost a couple through miscarriages, and so we were busy people during this time of getting kids born and getting life underway. Our second born was just a little under two years after our first came along, and She then met her sister a little less than four years later when. Our third child, another daughter, was born, and finally our fourth came a little less than three years after our third child. I remember a lovely That was sent to us by friends.
who lived in Texas, we had known for years. They had five children. And we were in Boston at the time in ministry and Uh They knew it was a little tough for us. Our third child had been born. And she was a live wire, and so we're busy getting her underway.
Our friend sent us this card that read as follows. Congratulations. You are just beginning to enjoy the delights. of parenthood. It only gets better.
and better.
Now, isn't that a nice Card descend. I'm up to my elbows in diapers, and I'm reading this lovely card. We really needed the encouragement, and I tell you, it brought it. It brought a surge of. joy, as a matter of fact, to an otherwise pressured period of time, as I anticipated some day.
it would just get better and better. And it has. And it does. We have no greater joy than to know our children now walk in the truth and are now adults. living their lives.
For God's glory. And uh admittedly some of it in spite of Our parenting. as we sort of learned our way along. It gets better and better. What is true of a relatively healthy and wholesome Christian home?
is all the more true of a healthy Christian life. It's tough getting started. I'm going to ask you to return to the very, very early days. When you came to Christ. I want you to remember how you felt.
I want you to remember what you went through. Perhaps for you there were habits formed that needed to be addressed and even broken. Maybe there were. Addictions. You needed to deal with.
Um Perhaps you had lived your life blaming and harboring resentment and. And bitterness toward others, and you had that to come to terms with. And then somebody put in your hands a book. Big thick book. Call the Bible.
They said, you read this, you find the answers. started looking through Where are those answers? And it was like a big puzzle to you. And it wasn't easy to understand. You couldn't put it together, but.
Remember the day when something Sort of. Fit. And it now became Truth to live by. What a breakthrough. And that led to yet another and yet another, and before long it just began to get better and better.
And you learned techniques and you learned an approach to walking with God and you learned how to share your faith with those who've never met Jesus. And uh then there you sort of Began your pace. In your giftedness and finding out how God wanted to use you. Everything begins at a point of time. It begins at the cross.
where we first or moved from darkness to light. from death to life. From a selfishness to Christ-likeness, it all comes. At the beginning of the cross relationship we have with Christ. Paul talks about this life before Christ for three full chapters in his letter to the Romans.
He illustrates it in the fourth chapter of the life of Abraham. And then when he gets to chapter five, it's like he sends us a note saying, congratulations. You are just beginning to discover the joys. Of walking with me, it'll only get better and better. And he immediately initiates our awareness into some of the things that just get better and better.
as we get to chapter five. This is like Paul's congratulatory note to us saying, All of that that you've gone through was meant for a purpose.
Now you need to hear some of the benefits that are going to be yours to enjoy. Before we get into them, I'd like to point out a couple of sort of general observations of these verses. Let me point out, first of all, that these 11 verses look into three different directions. They look into the past, they look at the present, and then they look into the future.
Now, how do I know that? How would you know that if you were reading this for the first time? Look at verse 1. Having been justified by faith, That's the past. It takes you back to your conversion.
takes you back to when you came to Christ. You realized that on your own you couldn't make it to heaven, you needed the merit of another, and Christ had paid the complete penalty for your sins, and you believed in Him, and you were at that moment declared righteous. By faith. Because of God's grace, apart from works. That's the past.
Then keep looking at verse one. We have peace with God. Through our Lord Jesus Christ. It's a present tense meaning we keep on having peace with God from one day to the next. We'll come back to that in a moment.
But that's the present. We have peace. We have hope. We have an entrance into grace. This is all the present.
Then look at verse 9. Notice the change in tense. Much more than, having now been justified by his blood, we shall be. Saved. That's future.
Verse 10: While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son. Much more, he repeats, having been reconciled, we shall be saved. That's the future. We'll get into that in a moment. Just want you to note the difference in the direction of the verses.
Past, mainly the present and then on into the future. Second observation I make is that these verses point out three major benefits. These are some of the delights that are the part of the Christian life that are ours from the get-go. You don't have to work your way into them or earn them. As soon as you've come through the cross to Christ, God, you are the recipient of these things.
And what are they?
Well, first, peace. We have p. Peace. We have it. Right now.
Peace. Not fine. from God, but peace. with God. How good is that?
Before the cross, we were at enmity. He moved in one direction, we were moving in another. We had a caricature in our mind of who God is. Having come to Christ There is a peace relationship. Between us, we have peace right now.
When I read those words, peace with God, I remembered the very first book I bought. for my beginning library. as a young Christian. It was called Peace with God by Billy Graham. Published in November of 1953.
When you've had a book this long, you notice that you can sort of. You can use it as a tract when you go different places. You can give, would you like page five? You could do that all the way through the book. It's just coming apart.
And yet, it is full of wonderful truth that Billy Graham came across and wrote about in his first book. I might add, it cost me 35 cents. This little simple book. Is taken, the title is taken from Romans 5.1. We have peace.
with God. Look how young. Graham looked back then. Cynthia and I heard him, though we didn't know each other at the time. We heard him in 1953 when he was in Houston at a crusade at Rice Stadium.
back then called Rice Institute. A new stadium had been built and he And we met and I thought, how will I ever feel? to overflowing. She realized then, as a counselor at the crusade, that God wanted her to marry a pastor's wife. and wanted her to be a pastor's wife.
I'm glad to get that straightened out now that. But I got to tell you, I was far from interested in being a pastor, and I was moving in a whole new direction. And through a series of events, too complicated to get into or lengthy, God turned my whole direction around. I go back to this verse, and I remember. I remember those very, very early growing days.
as a Christian. Peace with God. And this peace allows us to enter a whole new territory. Watch closely. Here's another of those benefits: through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith.
Into grace. There it is. Yeah.
Now, let me help you appreciate this. See the word introduction, it's the word for access in Greek. Think of a big gate. That opens up the territory, and the whole acreage in front of you is marked. Grace.
Remember, Alice and her world became Wonderland. As she moved from the old reality and stuff of her boring life into this whirlwind of fantasy. This isn't fantasy. But in the same way, in reality, the gate opens It opens up and we read We have this introduction by faith into the territory of grace. Don't go too quickly here, in which we stand.
Love that. We stand in it. It isn't a quick visit that we thank God for it and we move back into works. It isn't a delightful discovery and then things change. No, no, no, no.
It's a place in which we stand. Every child of God when born again enters into, because of faith in Christ, the territory of grace that becomes our acreage. It is the place of our habitation. John Stott puts it like this. Prasagoge is the Greek word that has a certain touch of formality about it.
That's the word translated introduction. Although it is uncertain whether the imagery is of a person being brought into God's sanctuary to worship. or into a king's audience chamber to be presented to him. The point is, we have taken our stand firmly in are on this grace into which we have been introduced. Justified believers enjoy a blessing far greater than a periodic approach to God or an occasional audience with the King.
We are privileged to live in the temple. to live in the palace. Our relationship with God into which justification has brought us is not sporadic but continuous. It's not precarious but secure. We do not fall in and out of grace like courtiers who may find themselves in and out of favor with their sovereign or politicians with the public.
No. We stand. In it. For that is the nature of grace. Nothing can separate us from God's love.
Before we get underway, we immediately have met the great truth of the peace of God, the peace with God, and then grace opening the door. to a whole world that's ours to claim. And In that we stand, and not surprisingly, in verse two, we Exult.
So the third benefit is joy. We don't use the word exalt much these days. We have the word exalt. But this is with a you exalt. Hard to find an English word that can handle the Greek term.
The best I can come up is. Jubilation. We jubilate. We explode in a triumphant joy. within our being.
By the way, the passage introduces now. three levels of rejoicing. The first is a more shallow, the second is deeper, and the third is the deepest. I get that from all three uses of exalt. Look at for yourself, verse 2.
We exalt in hope. Of the glory of God, that's one, first level. Not only this, we also exult in our tribulation, that's the second level. That takes us down through verse 8. And then look at verse 11: not only this, but we exalt in God Himself.
That's the third level. First, we exult in hope. Second, we exult in tribulation. Third, we exult in. God himself.
Let's look first at hope. Verse 2. In this territory of grace in which we stand, we Have triumphant joy in hope. Of the glory of God. What does that mean?
We have hope that we are being fashioned and formed into Christ's image. When we get to Romans 8, we will read that we have been predestined to be conformed to the image of God's Son Christ. That is our hope, to be like unto Christ, like unto God Himself, which is His glory. Think of it this way: we can live about 40 days without food, we can survive about eight days without water. Four minutes without air before damage occurs, and not long after that before we die.
But only a few seconds without hope. Take away hope. And you tumble. That's happened to some of you Recently. You had your heart set on something, and it didn't occur, and you've tumbled as a result.
of the loss of hope. Recently, I read about our forefathers in Jamestown. who were there for that bitter winter Which was so discouraging, and their hope was draining away as they were burying one loved one after another. Several, a handful of them decided to go back to their homeland in England. They got on board ship, and as it began to sail out of the harbor, Into the harbor came a Frenchman named Delaware.
As he arrived, he had fresh food and fresh goods and fresh lives with fresh faces of fresh hope. They were cheering as they came into the harbor. They'd come to the new land. Those who were on the old ship leaving without hope suddenly had a resurgence of hope. And they had the skipper turn around and bring him right back into the harbor.
What was the difference? Hope. Hope. One of the reasons that the delights just get better and better is that your hope in Christ becomes. increasingly more significant.
You realize as years pass that Christ has been at work. That he had his hand in life and in that circumstance and that hope. reminded you That you are being shaped and fashioned into the image of God's Son, Jesus.
So we jubilate in Hope. The second is a little more difficult to grasp because it doesn't come naturally. Hope naturally would make you jubilate. But tribulation? Look at verse 3.
Not only this. But we also triumphantly rejoice. in tribulation. Stay at that word for just long enough to understand its meaning. Thlipsis is a little hard to say.
Thlipsis is the Greek term, it means pressure. We exalt and pressure. There's probably no word for people engaged in responsible living than the word pressure, better than the word pressure. Pressure of deadlines, pressure of demands, pressure of the job, pressure of a change that's in front of you, or pressure of adjusting to a new lifestyle. pressure that comes from people's expectations.
pressure that builds up. And uh brings us to an end of ourselves. But he says there can be Jubilation. in tribulation. Jubilation in Tribulation.
I want to learn more about that, don't you? You're listening to Insight for Living. Chuck Swindahl is teaching from the pivotal fifth chapter of Romans. in which we learn how to experience the rewards of knowing Christ. Did you know that Paul, under the direction of the Holy Spirit, wrote nearly half the books in the New Testament?
But many believe that Romans was his finest contribution because it describes God's character and the gospel of Jesus Christ with depth and clarity. This is an essential book for believers to understand. Both seasoned Christ followers and new Christians. To help you in this process, Insight for Living offers an interactive spiral-bound Bible study. It's in our popular Searching the Scriptures format.
and because of the scope of Paul's letter, our Bible study comes in two workbooks. You'll find all the details for purchasing Volume 1 at insight.org slash offer. Or call us at 800-772-8888. I also want to draw your attention to a brand new hardback book from Chuck. It's called looking in all the right directions.
Drawing from Paul's wise counsel to his protégé Timothy, this book features the final five sermons Chuck delivered to the congregation that he shepherded for more than 25 years. From his heart, Chuck spoke about mentoring, enduring hardship, and using your God-given gifts. You will love the biblical wisdom that's captured in this book. and it would make a thoughtful gift for your pastor. It's called looking in all the right directions.
And you can purchase a copy by calling us at 800-772-8888 or go to insight.org/slash offer. Insight for Living is made possible not through the sale of books and Bible study resources, but by the generous gifts from grateful friends just like you.
So thank you so much for your continued faithfulness. To send a donation in the mail, write to us at InsightForLiving. Post Office Box 5000. Frisco, Texas, 75034. Need a strong dose of encouragement?
I'm Bill Meyer. Join us when Chuck Swindahl continues our study in Romans chapter 5. Friday on Insight for Living. The preceding message, Triumphant Joy, was copyrighted in 2007, 2010, and 2025, and the sound recording was copyrighted in 2025 by Charles R. Swindahl, Inc.
All rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial use is strictly prohibited.
