Do your best to explain Romans 5

[sdowney717]

But several times I presented Holy Writ showing we are all dead in our trespasses and only God can make us alive (Ephesians 2).

Is it your view that although we are dead in our trespasses, we have enough innate "goodness" to respond to the Gospel and meet God half way?

Or is it your view we did not inherit the sin of Adam, and as such there is nothing getting in the way of obeying God, keeping his commandments and as such can come to Him in perfect faith?

Yes, the dead are truly dead and do not follow Christ as they can not. They do not because they can not know spiritual things and truths, unless God makes them live in the Spirit. God is Spirit and seeks those who will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. To accomplish that He makes us alive who were dead and that is purely His gift to those He loves with a great love and this is not of ourselves, we are entirely His workmanship.

Christ does not tell dead men to follow Him! He tells His disciple here those people are dead, just as dead and cold and unfeeling to Him as those who are physically dead and buried. The dead care only about dead things of this world and the imagination of man's heart is continually evil from his youth.

Matthew 8:21-23 New King James Version (NKJV)
21 Then another of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.”

22 But Jesus said to him, “Follow Me, and let the dead bury their own dead.”

Which is why regeneration precedes our faithful response. We must first be born of God, born again before we can see-perceive the kingdom of God, John 3 plainly says this. If we can not see the kingdom, we can not understand who Christ is, because we are spiritually dead.

John 3
3 Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except one be born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

See in the greek means to know anything about, perceive, want to have anything to do with. We can not unless first we are born again, otherwise we want nothing to do with Christ in a genuine true way.

The word 'see' here
εἴδω
Transliteration
eidō
Genesis 1:1 (KJV)

means

1. to see
   1. to perceive with the eyes
      
      
   2. to perceive by any of the senses
      
      
   3. to perceive, notice, discern, discover
      
      
   4. to see
      1. i.e. to turn the eyes, the mind, the attention to anything
         
         
      2. to pay attention, observe
         
         
      3. to see about something
         1. i.e. to ascertain what must be done about it
      4. to inspect, examine
         
         
      5. to look at, behold
   5. to experience any state or condition
      
      
   6. to see i.e. have an interview with, to visit
2. to know
   1. to know of anything
      
      
   2. to know, i.e. get knowledge of, understand, perceive
      1. of any fact
         
         
      2. the force and meaning of something which has definite meaning
         
         
      3. to know how, to be skilled in
   3. to have regard for one, cherish, pay attention to (1Th. 5:12)

 

[mark kennedy]

I agree with this. But that is not the full meaning of Roman 5:17 .

"much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ."

"All" those (meaningly every single person in the world) who receive Christ will be saved. If the teacher says to the class: "Those who want ice cream, hold up your hand". The teacher is talking to everyone, the offer is for everyone, the whole class, received by holding up the hand.

Well the promise is to whosoever will, and all who are redemned are delivered to righteousness of God in Christ. We know everyone receives a general revelation so even though the uncommitted of this age aren't raised with the church, redemption is still possible at the Great White Throne judgment.

 

[συνείδησις]

How do we "get" faith when we are already dead in our trespasses and children of wrath (Ephesians 2)?

How can children of wrath who are spiritually dead in their trespasses accomplish this feat. The dead don't hear. They are dead.

You obviously don't understand, or don't believe, John 6:44-45.

btw that's a great picture in your signature, but do you realize how much it inconveniences everyone to have to scroll so much to get to the next post?

 

[sdowney717]

You obviously don't understand, or don't believe, John 6:44-45.

btw that's a great picture in your signature, but do you realize how much it inconveniences everyone to have to scroll so much to get to the next post?

What your teaching is man does this on his own natural ability, seeing and hearing and learning from the Father! That is Pelagianism, a heresy condemned long ago.

Those people who come to Christ do so because they have been born of God. They are the ones who God teaches about Christ and all born again see and enter into the kingdom of God, according to His purpose and will for them.

 

[συνείδησις]

Yes, the dead are truly dead and do not follow Christ as they can not. They do not because they can not know spiritual things and truths, unless God makes them live in the Spirit. God is Spirit and seeks those who will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. To accomplish that He makes us alive who were dead and that is purely His gift to those He loves with a great love and this is not of ourselves, we are entirely His workmanship.

Christ does not tell dead men to follow Him! He tells His disciple here those people are dead, just as dead and cold and unfeeling to Him as those who are physically dead and buried. The dead care only about dead things of this world and the imagination of man's heart is continually evil from his youth.

John 6:44-45 contradicts what you've said. Men who are dead in their sins do hear and learn of the father from the holy spirit. GOD woos people to come to Christ.

 

[zoidar]

Well the promise is to whosoever will, and all who are redemned are delivered to righteousness of God in Christ. We know everyone receives a general revelation so even though the uncommitted of this age aren't raised with the church, redemption is still possible at the Great White Throne judgment.

To me redeemed and righteous is the same thing.

Do you believe in a second chance of salvation at the throne of judgement?

 

[sdowney717]

John 6:44-45 contradicts what you've said. Men who are dead in their sins do hear and learn of the father from the holy spirit. GOD woos people to come to Christ.

First off, only those drawn come to Christ. There are none drawn who do not come to Christ. The ones drawn are the ones raised up to life on the last Day.
The explanation for v45, Christ tells us you must hear and learn. This is not just natural hearing, it is supernatural according to the Spirit to be taught spiritual things and to believe them you must become a spiritual man, and the natural man is dead, the carnal mind is at enmity with God. All in v45 is referring to all who are drawn, not all men. And all so drawn can hear and learn and all of them come to Christ, BECAUSE they have been granted - enabled by the Father to believe in Christ.

John 6
44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up at the last day. 45 It is written in the prophets, ‘And they shall all be taught by God.’ Therefore everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to Me.

Romans 9
6 For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace.
7 Because the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. 8 So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

9 But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His.

YOU CAN NOT choose to be anything except what you are, it is not in your own power. If you have a carnal mind this means you are dead, not born of God and you are at war and hatred of God and Christ.

 

[mark kennedy]

You obviously don't understand, or don't believe, John 6:44-45

I'm not entirely sure sure what your getting at here. What stands out in my mind is that unless the Father calls us we cannot follow Christ. Everyone who has responded to the call of the Father receives Christ. I don't see a contradiction between that and being dead in trespass and sin since that's what the Father is calling you out of.

To me redemed and righteous is the same thing.

Do you believe in a second chance of salvation at the throne of judgement?

Absolutely, the church is translated at the return of Christ, a thousand years later it's everyone else. Some are saved and some are lost, at that point God judges them based on the hidden motives of the heart. I mean think about it, how many people never had a chance to hear the gospel or for whatever reason never converted. That is what is revealed at the Great White Throne judgment, the eternal state of the balance of humanity.

 

[συνείδησις]

Yes, the dead are truly dead and do not follow Christ as they can not. They do not because they can not know spiritual things and truths, unless God makes them live in the Spirit. God is Spirit and seeks those who will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth. To accomplish that He makes us alive who were dead and that is purely His gift to those He loves with a great love and this is not of ourselves, we are entirely His workmanship.

Christ does not tell dead men to follow Him! He tells His disciple here those people are dead, just as dead and cold and unfeeling to Him as those who are physically dead and buried. The dead care only about dead things of this world and the imagination of man's heart is continually evil from his youth.

John 6:44-45 contradicts what you've said. Men who are dead in their sins do hear and learn of the father from the holy spirit. GOD woos people to come to Christ.

 

[zoidar]

What your teaching is man does this on his own natural ability, seeing and hearing and learning from the Father! That is Pelagianism, a heresy condemned long ago.

Those people who come to Christ do so because they have been born of God. They are the ones who God teaches about Christ and all born again see and enter into the kingdom of God, according to His purpose and will for them.

I would disagree! Those people who come to Christ, come not because they are born of God, but to be born of God.

 

[zoidar]

Absolutely, the church is translated at the return of Christ, a thousand years later it's everyone else. Some are saved and some are lost, at that point God judges them based on the hidden motives of the heart. I mean think about it, how many people never had a chance to hear the gospel or for whatever reason never converted. That is what is revealed at the Great White Throne judgment, the eternal state of the balance of humanity.

Salvation is in Christ, that I know. How God will judge everything in the end, those who never heard etc. only God knows.

 

[συνείδησις]

What your teaching is man does this on his own natural ability, seeing and hearing and learning from the Father! That is Pelagianism, a heresy condemned long ago.

Those people who come to Christ do so because they have been born of God. They are the ones who God teaches about Christ and all born again see and enter into the kingdom of God, according to His purpose and will for them.

So people are born of GOD before they come to Christ. LOL. Calvinism keeps getting curiouser and curiouser.

 

[RDKirk]

12 "Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned"

Does this verse really mean: "Through one man, death spread to gentiles as well as Jews" ? It could, but isn't it more likely that Paul is talking about mankind? Is he saying this for us to understand that both Jews and gentiles are under the sin of Adam? Or is he talking about that mankind was brought under sin because of Adam?

You seem to think what you said indicates a distinction.

 

[sdowney717]

So people are born of GOD before they come to Christ. LOL. Calvinism keeps getting curiouser and curiouser.

That may seem radical idea to you, it did to me at first until I studied and learned the scriptures.
See in you way of thinking you choose Him first, but we are not born of God by the will of ourselves.
Yes we receive Christ as Lord, but first we must be born of God as John 3:3 says.

John 1
12 But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: 13 who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

1 John 5 English Standard Version (ESV)
Overcoming the World
1 Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father loves whoever has been born of him.

 

[mark kennedy]

Salvation is in Christ, that I know. How God will judge everything in the end, those who never heard etc. only God knows.

That much is true, but everyone who is ultimately saved is saved in Christ, there was never a plan h. I think at final judgment God reveals the secret motives, we know what people do, God knows why. We know that there are a number of people who cry Lord, did we not do many things in your name only to hear I never knew you.who knows how many people will find redemption by having done what they could with the light they recieved. People who never had a chance to hear the gospel, or otherwise never understood it. Then those who had it and never came to a saving knowledge of Christ. As the Lord told us, the first shall be last and the last shall be first. It's a difficult thing to wrap your mind around, which is why we all do well to do the most we can with the light we receive because this life is so short and eternity hangs in the balance.

Grace and peace,
Mark

 

[zoidar]

You seem to think what you said indicates a distinction.

It's not that there is a distinction between mankind and "Jews and gentiles". The difference is in what Paul is saying. Is his focus to point out there is no difference between Jews and gentiles when it comes to being under Adam's sin, or is he simply saying all mankind is under Adam's sin. The point of focus is different.

The difference is: You can say: Jews and gentiles will be saved. It's not the same as saying mankind will be saved. Jews and gentiles don't mean all Jews and gentiles. Mankind means all men, everyone.

 

[Knee V]

Paul's epistles are understood in the context of him refuting the heresy of the Judaizers. The thrust of their error was that they believed that because they were physically descended from Abraham and the Patriarchs and were given a special covenant from God, and because they had received and (allegedly) kept the Law of Moses, and because Israel was "God's chosen people" out of all the nations in the world, that they were better than the Gentiles and had a better standing before God than the Gentiles did; that they were inherently righteous and that God was friendly toward them, and that the Gentiles were inherently enemies of God and unrighteous sinners.

And there were other elements of the beliefs of the Judaizers, but that is at least what is relevant in Romans 5.

What Paul does - here, as well as in the rest of Romans and his other epistles - is to turn that on its head, and make the case that what the Israelites think applies to the Gentiles applies to everybody; that not only are Gentiles "by nature children of wrath" and "sinners", etc, but Israelites are as well. They are just as "bad off" as the Gentiles are. Additionally, what they think applies to themselves applies to everyone who has been baptized into Christ; everyone in Christ is "God's chosen people", are righteous, are friends of God, not just the Israelites.

When Paul talks about "all men", the point he is making is that it applies equally to Gentiles and to Jews, not just the good things applying only to Jews and the bad things applying only to Gentiles.

The passage from Romans 5 that seems to be causing the most contention here is verse 12 and on. Paul is making the case that everyone - Jews and Gentiles alike - are affected by the effects of Adam's transgression, as Adam is father of everyone, Jews and Gentiles alike. He even goes on to emphasize that one of the things that the Israelites thought made them so special - the Law - is the very thing that compounds their sin and their condemnation. So not only does it not make them special, if anything it makes them worse off, since they have that knowledge of what God expects but still do not do it. And now it is through Christ, not the Law, that all men, Jews as well as Gentiles, are made righteous.

 

[112358]

But several times I presented Holy Writ showing we are all dead in our trespasses and only God can make us alive (Ephesians 2).

Is it your view that although we are dead in our trespasses, we have enough innate "goodness" to respond to the Gospel and meet God half way?

Or is it your view we did not inherit the sin of Adam, and as such there is nothing getting in the way of obeying God, keeping his commandments and as such can come to Him in perfect faith?

I think you misunderstand the concept of spiritual death. It is not the same as physical death. Unless you are an annihilationist (many are). Unlike physical death, where the physical body simply ceases to exist, the spiritual body continues in eternity, whether "alive" in the presence of God, or "dead" separated from Him. And no I don't believe I inherited Adam's sin. I inherited his sin nature, but I was created in the image and likeness of God, so I am not totally depraved. I am capable of making a choice to believe and obey, or not. It was when I made that choice that His grace was imparted to me, when I put on Christ it was then that my old spirit of death (separation from God) was itself put to death, and I arose a new spiritual creature, no longer separated (dead) from Him but now united with Him (alive) through His blood. It is that blood that continues to cleanse me of all my sins, provided I continue in the Faith and walk in the Light.

Same choice Joshua made and challenged Israel to make. Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve.

 

[Arthur B Via]

Romans 5:18 I feel summarizes the chapter in a concise way.

One chapter I've been reading maybe more than any other chapter in the Bible, that is Romans 5. Since it's a description of the atonement, it's a very central chapter of the Bible. Do your best to explain the whole, or just a part of Romans 5. Let us discuss this chapter and do our best to understand it.

Christ love,

P

 

[Knee V]

12 "Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned"

Does this verse really mean: "Through one man, death spread to gentiles as well as Jews" ? It could, but isn't it more likely that Paul is talking about mankind? Is he saying this for us to understand that both Jews and gentiles are under the sin of Adam? Or is he talking about that mankind was brought under sin because of Adam?

Taken in isolation, it might be hard to tell what it is referring to. However, the context behind nearly all of Paul's epistles is the context of the heresy of the Judaizers. In that light, nearly every topic is about showing that Jews and Gentiles are in the same boat outside of Christ, and in the same boat in Christ.