See How Much God Loves You!

4th Sunday after Pentecost, 7/6/14
Romans 5:6-11


See How Much God Loves You!
I. He died for the ungodly.
II. He assures you of your salvation.


A University of Texas study involved counting the number of words people speak. The researchers chose roughly 400 students, almost equal amounts of men and women, and then counted the words they spoke each day over a period time.

Would you like to guess the average number of words spoken by the individuals in the test group? Right about 16,000 and it was the same for men as for women. The lowest was 500 per day and the highest was 47,000. 47,000! Assuming none of those words were spoken while asleep and assuming 7 hours of sleep, that’s almost 2,800 per hour, compared with the average of about 1,000 per hour.

I’d be interested in a study of how many of those words were meaningful. After all, talk is cheap. People say a lot of things each day without any intent behind them. At times we even tell people what they want to hear, even though that’s not how we think or feel.

The Bible is filled with words from our God. But unlike the words spoken by human beings, every one of them is meaningful. In fact, they’re critically important for us. And every one of them—either directly or indirectly—focuses on this one great truth: God loves sinners. And he not only tells you that in his word; he shows it. He backs up his words with his action.

That action is evident in his words to us this morning from this portion of Paul’s Letter to the Romans. Join me in looking at it. See how much God loves you! May his love for you fill you with love for him.

Part I.

Sometime this month the Medal of Honor will be awarded to Ryan Pitts of Nashua, NH. He’s receiving the award for successfully defending a position against 200 Taliban fighters while wounded and bleeding in both legs and an arm. He also used a tactic known as “cooking off” grenades, pulling the pin and holding it longer than usual so the enemy couldn’t throw it back. But Pitts maintains that the medal doesn’t belong to him. It belongs to his nine comrades who died that day. Pitts states that they sacrificed themselves so that he could live and return home to his family.

Sacrificial deaths happen and not only in military battles. What mother wouldn’t sacrifice her life for the life of her child? Recently a Dayton area father died trying to rescue his children from a burning house.

St. Paul talks about sacrificial deaths as well. He mentions two scenarios. Listen to them again. “Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die.”

Here you have a righteous man. His intentions and his actions are right and good. He’s a godly person. Would you die for him? Paul says that’s a very rare situation. The righteous man shouldn’t count on it happening.

Over here you have a good man. He does what is good for others.

He uses his position and his power to benefit others. Would you die for him? Paul states it’s slightly more likely that you would. But still, the good man shouldn’t count on it happening.

Paul presents both cases to emphasize this one point: don’t count on such a sacrificial death happening. It just doesn’t happen that often. Even though these men are righteous and good, it’s not enough to sacrifice your life for them.

But look at what your God did for you! You and I were not good or righteous. Paul states, “You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless.” Some translations have the word “helpless” in place of “powerless.” The point is that we couldn’t do anything that would make God want to do anything for us. None of our words, none of our actions, not even any of our sacrifices would move God to do anything for us.

What was our problem? Paul states, “While we were still sinners.” There you have it. We weren’t the cute, lovable creatures that we might think we are. It wasn’t the case that we were spiritually neutral towards God and just needed a little love to make us lovable. We were sinners. We had willfully and knowingly violated the decrees of the holy God. Every one of our sins declares to God that we don’t care what he says; we’ll do what we want. By nature we want our sinful way, not God’s holy way.

In fact, we’re the ungodly ones that Paul talks about. By nature I’m ungodly. So are you. In another place Paul informs us that in our natural, unbelieving state, we’re hostile to God. We want nothing to do with him.

Notice the deep contrast. It’s rare indeed for one human being to die for a righteous or good human being. But what does God do? “Christ died for the ungodly.” He does what we would never do, what would never happen in our world.

What would cause him to do such a thing? Love. Divine love. The purest, deepest love there is. And he doesn’t just tell us he loves us. He shows it. See how much God loves you! He died for the ungodly.

“I’ll love you if…” Those are some of the most cruel words ever spoken. There isn’t an ounce, not a trace, of love in them. That’s not love; that’s manipulation, which is a form of hatred.

And yet we tend to think like that when it comes to God’s love for us. Who of us hasn’t thought, “God will love me if I…” Or worse, we look at the dire situation around us and we conclude, “God must not love me. Look at the way he’s treating me.”

That flies in the face not only of what God tells us, but also of what he did. While we were powerless to cause him to love us, sinners who didn’t deserve his goodness, ungodly, Christ died for us. Do you realize how astounding that is? It’s unheard of in our world and yet it’s the very heart and core of what our God proclaims to us. There was never anything in us that makes him love us. He loves us because of who he is. That love caused him to die for us. That love goes with us every day of our lives in spite of the terrible things we’ve done and in spite of our dire surroundings. See how much God loves you. He died for the ungodly. For you. For me.

Part II.

It’ll be fine,” says your friend. Your less-than-confident reply is, “I hope so.”
Situations like that occur daily in our lives. We hope for the best, but we know it might not happen. In fact, tragedy could occur.

Is our Christian faith much the same? Are we living this life hoping that everything will be fine, especially when we die? Are we simply left to hope we’ll get to heaven, but won’t be sure until we finally step inside heaven’s gate and into our Savior’s waiting arms?

Let’s be honest. One of the truths the Bible states repeatedly is the judgment on the Last Day. That prospect doesn’t fill us with warm fuzzies. Just the opposite. What if something goes wrong? Look at all the reasons it could go wrong! There have been countless times that my Christianity was hidden behind my blatant sins. What if I don’t hear Jesus says to me, “Come, take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you” (Mt. 25:34)? What if I hear the opposite?

Wait a minute! Stop right there. Stop and see how much God loves you. Paul helps us do just that with these words, “Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!” In short, Paul states there’s no reason to doubt whether you’ll reach eternal life in heaven or make it through the Judgment on the Last Day. Paul reminds us that our God has already done the difficult thing for us. When we were his enemies, he reconciled us to himself. He did that on a hill called Calvary 2,000 years ago. That’s what the death of Jesus was all about. In taking the punishment for our sins on himself, Jesus reconciled us to God. We’re no longer God’s enemies.

We’re reconciled to God. We’re his friends. We’re his sons and daughters by faith in Jesus. There no reason to doubt about reaching heaven or about getting through the judgment on the Last Day. How can we be sure? Because Jesus lives. He rose from the dead. His resurrection assures us that everything has been accomplished for our eternal life. His resurrection assures us that he will declare us to be his own people on the Last Day.

So, rather than doubt, let’s rejoice. That’s exactly what Paul urges us to do at the very end of our text. We have no reason to doubt about our future. There’s no reason to think we need to scratch and claw our way to heaven. Jesus has done everything for us. The victory belongs to him forever and he shares that victory with us no matter what you’re facing right now.

See how much God loves you! He assures you of your salvation.

Rejoice. That’s not so easy. In fact, it can be difficult when you see what a mess our world is in and how our sins have only helped to make it so. It can be difficult to rejoice when each day is a battle and it looks like you’re not winning the war. That’s exactly when we need to see the love of our God. He knows how tough this life is. He came to live it perfectly for us. And then he died and rose again to assure us that nothing can separate us from his love, a love he will wrap around us forever. He guarantees it. Believe it! See how much God loves you! Amen.