The Wondrous Exchange

Introduction

We’ve been going through the book of Romans and have come upon a passage of scripture that is very familiar to those who went through OSL (our discipleship program) It one of the memory verse. I want to take some time unpacking it a bit and expanding on what perhaps some of you have understood about your salvation. If you haven’t heard this stuff before then, you will have a better understanding of what Christianity is really about. Either way, I pray that as we explore what scripture has to say about our standing before God will rejuvenate your spiritual self, allowing you to see yourself in a whole new light- in the way God sees you.

Up until this point, we’ve discovered that God is righteous, and that His righteousness reveals to us our sinfulness. We learned that whether we live under the law or under the law written in our heart- we are without hope because it is impossible to fulfill the requirement of the law.

Let’s open up the word together and take a look:

Romans 5:1–5 TLV

Therefore, having been made righteous by trusting, we have shalom with God through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah. Through Him we also have gained access by faith into this grace in which we stand and boast in the hope of God’s glory. And not only that, but we also boast in suffering—knowing that suffering produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Ruach ha-Kodesh who was given to us.

The first couple of verses here recap the beginning of the letter. It is the logical conclusion to Chapters 1-4.

We are justified by our faith, and that faith makes peace with God via the sacrifice that God made for us. That same sacrifice of Christ give us access to the faith we need to appropriate the grace that not only gives us our salvation, but gives us access to the grace we need to live life for the glory of God.

The passage goes on to point out that we have a hope that does not disappoint because of the love of God that is poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

Now Paul goes on to tell us the why:

Romans 5:6–11 TLV

For while we were still helpless, at the right time Messiah died for the ungodly. For rarely will anyone die for a righteous man—though perhaps for a good man someone might even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Messiah died for us. How much more then, having now been set right by His blood, shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him. For if, while we were yet enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved by His life. And not only that, but we also boast in God through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah, through whom we have now received reconciliation.

That’s pretty powerful. What is it exactly that God is saving us from? What is it that requires the death of Jesus to atone for? To understand, we have to go back to the beginning.

Genesis 2:15–17 TLV

Then Adonai Elohim took the man and gave him rest in the Garden of Eden in order to cultivate and watch over it. Then Adonai Elohim commanded the man saying, “From all the trees of the garden you are most welcome to eat. But of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil you must not eat. For when you eat from it, you most assuredly will die!

So God gave man 1 commandment, and that was that he would not eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. He then told them that on the day they did, they would surely die. The Hebrew there is: OSLers- Do you remember?

מוּת מוּת

Do you remember? The phrase is “mooth mooth” which translated more literally is “Dying you shall die.”

So God was saying, that in the day you disobey me, you shall begin the process of dying. What is the beginning of that process? Well let’s go back to Romans really quickly.

Romans 5:12–14 TLV

So then, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, in the same way death spread to all men because all sinned. For up until the Torah, sin was in the world; but sin does not count as sin when there is no law. Nevertheless death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over those who had not sinned in a manner similar to the violation of Adam, who is a pattern of the One to come.

So here we see that death came to all men, but how exactly did it start out? I mean the serpent kind of told Eve the truth when he said she would not die, right? She didn’t drop dead right there did she? Well, of course we know she eventually died some 900 years later, but was that it? Let us look at the nature of man. Just like God, man is made up of three parts:

1 Thessalonians 5:23 TLV

Now may the God of shalom Himself make you completely holy; and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept complete, blameless at the coming of our Lord Yeshua the Messiah.

What happens with sin is that death enters our being. Remember, Romans 5:12 says just as through one man sin entered and death through sin, then we know that at the point of sinfulness we begin to die. From when are you and I sinful?

Psalm 51:5 TLV

For I know my transgressions and my sin is ever before me.

So pretty much from conception right? So as we are sinful from the time we are born, we are basically born to die. Romans 8:6 says that we are carnally minded, and that is death.

Romans 8:6–8 TLV

For the mindset of the flesh is death, but the mindset of the Ruach is life and shalom. For the mindset of the flesh is hostile toward God, for it does not submit itself to the law of God—for it cannot. So those who are in the flesh cannot please God.

Now, let’s go back to the beginning. Right after the fall of man what happened?

Genesis 3:7–11 TLV

Then the eyes of both of them were opened and they knew that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made for themselves loin-coverings. And they heard the sound of Adonai Elohim going to and fro in the garden in the wind of the day. So the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of Adonai Elohim in the midst of the Tree of the garden. Then Adonai Elohim called to the man and He said to him, “Where are you?” Then he said, “Your sound—I heard it in the garden and I was afraid. Because I am naked, I hid myself.” Then He said, “Who told you that you are naked? Have you eaten from the Tree from which I commanded you not to eat?”

Why did Adam hide himself? Did he hide because he was naked or because he disobeyed God? He became very self-conscious after having sin and did what we all do when we goof up. We hide! We don’t want our sin exposed. This is exactly what Adam did, and in so doing he demonstrated that dying he would die. See, with that act of shame he showed that he had begun to die not only physically, but spiritually and in his soul as well. There was no sudden clutching of the heart and dropping dead, instead there was to be a gradual death, starting with sudden separation from God followed by an eventual physical death.

Now consider the death of Jesus Himself:

Mark 15:34–37 TLV

At the ninth hour Yeshua cried out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which is translated, “My God, My God, why have You abandoned Me?” When some of the bystanders heard it, they began saying, “Look, He’s calling for Elijah.” Then someone ran and filled a sponge with sour wine. He put it on a stick and was offering it to Yeshua to drink, saying, “Wait, let’s see if Elijah comes to take Him down.” But letting out a loud cry, Yeshua breathed His last.

What happened here? Jesus suffered two deaths, the first was a spiritual death- “MY GOD MY GOD! WHY HAVE YOU ABANDONED ME!”

When Jesus finally dies physically, He had already experienced a spiritual death.

Paul says that sin came and has been passed on to all of us through Adam; if sin, then the wages of sin as well.

Romans 6:23 TLV

For sin’s payment is death, but God’s gracious gift is eternal life in Messiah Yeshua our Lord.

So then, we come to the following conclusion that Paul makes to the Corinthians:

2 Corinthians 5:14–21 TLV

For the love of Messiah compels us, since we have concluded that One died for all; as a result all died. And He died for all so that those who live might no longer live for themselves, but for the One who died for them and was raised. So from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh. Even though we have known Messiah according to the flesh, yet now we no longer know Him this way. Therefore if anyone is in Messiah, he is a new creation. The old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Messiah and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, in Messiah God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them; and He has entrusted the message of reconciliation to us. We are therefore ambassadors for Messiah, as though God were making His appeal through us. We beg you on behalf of Messiah, be reconciled to God. He made the One who knew no sin to become a sin offering on our behalf, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.

We are no longer the sinful creatures we were born as, we’ve become an entirely new creature. Old things are passed away. Even our testimony must not dwell on what we did in the past- it is buried in God’s field of forgetfulness. We are not to regard our past because that is not who we are! We are who He says we are! We can have what He says we can have and do what He says we can do! Is this not a word that can change your life forever?

When Jesus died on the cross, He experienced spiritual and physical death to pay the penalty for our sins. The flesh will surely die because it has no way to please God, but the Spirit yearns to live for God because it has been made alive by the sacrifice of Jesus. Because the flesh is temporary, we are not to regard each other according to the flesh, only according to the spirit!

We are also not to regard ourselves according to our own flesh. We are to see ourselves only as God sees us, and He sees us only through the lens that was provided by the sacrifice of Jesus!

Romans 6:1–14 TLV

What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may abound? May it never be! How can we who died to sin still live in it? Or do you not know that all of us who were immersed into Messiah Yeshua were immersed into His death? Therefore we were buried together with Him through immersion into death—in order that just as Messiah was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have become joined together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also will be joined together in His resurrection— knowing our old man was crucified with Him so that the sinful body might be done away with, so we no longer serve sin. For he who has died is set free from sin. Now if we have died with Messiah, we believe that we shall also live with Him. We know that Messiah, having been raised from the dead, no longer dies; death no longer is master over Him. For the death He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life He lives, He lives to God. So also continually count yourselves both dead to sin and alive to God in Messiah Yeshua. Therefore do not let sin rule in your mortal body so that you obey its desires. And do not keep yielding your body parts to sin as tools of wickedness; but yield yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your body parts as tools of righteousness to God. For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law but under grace.

Oh child of God! Don’t you see? You don’t have to live in constant torture about what a wretched person you are! God has already made the exchange, He has given you a new life by dying the death you deserved.

Galatians 2:20 TLV

and it is no longer I who live, but Messiah lives in me. And the life I now live in the body, I live by trusting in Ben-Elohim—who loved me and gave Himself up for me.

Conclusion

Jesus Himself managed what Luther called a “wondrous exchange” and that is that He exchanged our sinfulness for His righteousness. That is the good news today, you see, because of this exchange you can’t see yourself the way you were as if you were bound and determined to fall back into the old patterns. How can you if you are a new creature? When then enemy comes around and tries to remind you of your past, you can tell him, “That person no longer exists- he was crucified with Christ- the person you see now is a new creature, old things are passed away.”